Milo Garner reviews Werner Herzog’s intimate new film at BFI LFF 2019.

Werner Herzog has a penchant for representing the alienated. His great films of the ’70s and ’80s have always centred on those who have lost touch – or who have never been in touch – with the world around them:  the raving king Aguirre stumbling on his forsaken raft; the vampire Nosferatu, reduced to a lovelorn welp; the wandering, ever-lost Stroszek drifting through the hinterlands of America. Even in his more conventional output – not least the Nicholas Cage vehicle Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans – his protagonists seem a step removed from their reality. Herzog himself might be described similarly. He is by no means a loner, nor a reject – few rejects nab a guest spot in The Simpsons, let alone a role in the latest Star Wars project – but nonetheless he seems to share something of the errant madness that infects many of his leading players.

His latest film Family Romance, LLC considers alienation from its inverse. It concerns Ishii Yuchii, the founder of the eponymous company, which provides a rental service for family members and friends. Though much like something pulled from a Charlie Kaufman script, this company is genuine, and while the incidents in the film are largely scripted, they often drift into the realm of documentary – a realm in which Herzog is, of course, immersed. The Japan of his film, and, by extension, the Japan of reality, is a country wherein alienation has become the norm – a country in which a company like Family Romance not only exists, but feels much at home. This film is sci-fi, dystopian, but not with much need to invent or fabricate.

The aesthetic of the film is notable in this respect. Shot on a handheld digital camera (operated by Herzog himself, with additional footage from producer Roc Morin), a visual style reminiscent of low-budget filmmaking techniques pervades throughout. The privilege of Herzog’s name is difficult to ignore; had a new director submitted a film of this technical quality, there is little chance his film would feature at such a prestigious festival as LFF.

However, this low-quality style – the rollicking, imprecise camerawork of an aging director using a relatively cheap camera – suggests a distinctly relevant aesthetic question. Considering the fictional premise, the imprecision implies an artificiality, as though the means of this film’s making are constantly revealed and thus a constant reminder of its untruth. This artificiality is then complemented by its opposite:  much of what takes place in the film is inescapably real. An extended scene of children playing with and petting a hedgehog is essentially documentary, as is the sequence of crowds gathering around a certain stunt pulled in the middle of the film. In these moments the ramshackle production no longer suggests falsity, as though the film exists on a thin line between an unconvincing fiction and an uncomfortable reality. No doubt much of the amateurism is a result of inexpert hands and low budget, but the effect suggested by these choices synthesises with the film otherwise closely and consistently.

The narrative of the film follows Ishii Yuchii – played, naturally, by himself – as he completes various jobs for his company. The most significant is to fill in as someone’s ex-husband, acting as a returned father to a young Mahiro (too young to recognize true- from false-dad). The ethics here are obviously sketchy, but more distinctly interesting is the question of affect. The happiness Mahiro experiences with her faux-father is no less ‘real’ than it would have been with her actual (and still absent) father.

This conclusion leads to the further observation that so much of the modern world is constructed through falsehood. Instagram is briefly mentioned (though not with the dismissive grimace of an angsty boomer; Herzog’s interest in burgeoning tech has aged him well). In this increasingly pervasive online sphere, reality and unreality are becoming more indistinct. In a chemical sense – the sense of dopamine and serotonin – the actions of Ishii Yuchi and his company could be considered noble. They are providing happiness where it would otherwise not exist. They are perhaps not a symptom of an increasingly isolated world, but its cure – the first step towards a future where artificiality and authenticity are intertwined and indistinguishable. This idea is not far from Kiarostami’s Certified Copy, a film that considers a similar ground to Family Romance, LLC, if more elegantly.

This sentiment, however, does suggest an unease – perhaps an orientalist, exotic discomfort for a Western observer. This burgeoning culture peals like a cheap sci-fi novel, and not one of the utopic bent. Herzog, while generally reserved in his judgement, seems to sympathise with this assessment; his inclusion of ‘LLC’ in the title, as noted by Peter Debruge for Variety, seems an ironic undermining of the two words prior. Eric Kohn, writing for Indiewire, further suggests that the film engages in a subtle critique of such widespread and all-consuming capitalism as Family Romance requires, in which commerce now encompasses friends, family, and love – all things that money supposedly cannot buy.

For Herzog, though, love is the problem. To quote the late Daniel Johnston, ‘true love will find us in the end,’ and this film proves no different. The dramatic crux – late in arrival but no less affective – concerns Ishii Yuchii and the realisation that he has begun to develop a genuine affection for his surrogate daughter. This is calamitous for his work. The ghost in the machine is just that – the artificiality of this new world can only function so long as its purveyors remain genuinely detached and unaffected. This, Herzog supposes, quite contradicts the human spirit.

While this is the lasting impression, it is not a conclusion entirely. Earlier in the film, Herzog follows Ishii Yuchii into a ‘robot hotel’ – a gimmick establishment in which the hotel staff and even its fish are robots. Herzog here suggests a cyborg future in which capitalist service might circumvent the foibles of human limitation. Even then, the director is wont to consider beyond this bleak premonition. Speaking a line that can be read in no voice but Herzog’s, Ishii asks the hotel’s (human) proprietor whether robots can dream – a throwaway ‘shower thought,’ for the moment. More so, however, this is Herzog thinking beyond the gimmickry of contemporary robotics. True love will find us in the end, sure – but perhaps it’ll find them, too. A scrappy, micro-budgeted, and inconsistent docu-drama, Family Romance, LLC rests far from Herzog’s most compelling output, but it is nonetheless a cogent, even affecting investigation of concepts central to humankind’s present and future.

7/10

Family Romance, LLC is showing in select cinemas. Check out the trailer below:

Milo Garner meets Orçun Behram’s horror debut, The Antenna, at BFI LFF 2019.

I met The Antenna at a party and he wouldn’t shut the fuck up. I was in the kitchen when he approached me, and initially, I’ll say it, I wasn’t unimpressed. He had a sort of stylish way about him. Not exactly well-dressed, no, but he’d thought it through. Nearly postmodern, angular, almost smart but not quite. He spoke to me first – of course he would, I would later think – something about an anecdote he’d heard about a man who fell off the roof of a tower block. The whole thing was very bizarre, very deadpan.

The music was quiet at this point – someone had put on one of Aphex Twin’s slow tunes – and The Antenna seemed to be in his element, talking in that kind of husky whisper that suits certain men. But soon after, things started to devolve. I wasn’t entirely sure what he was drinking – for some reason he’d poured whatever beer it was into a clear tumbler – but he had told me it was a lot like Kronenbourg. But not quite. Watered down maybe? Or, as I later came to suspect, his own imitation brew. He offered it to me enough, assuming – for a reason quite beyond me – that it’d be in some way to my taste. And sure, I do like Kronenbourg. I’d go so far as to say I really like Kronenbourg, in the right situation. But this diluted swill only got worse the closer I got to the dregs. And The Antenna seemed intent on not letting me leave the kitchen, that much seemed clear.

After telling me about the man who fell off the roof he segued – quite incoherently, I should add – into what would become an endless rant about television. Nothing particular, mind, just that TV was bad, and rotting our brains, and whatever the fuck else cliché you could pull out of a ’90s WhiteDot screed. He grabbed my shoulder emphatically more than once, only to let go with a theatrical raising of both arms at some sort of climatic ‘revelation’. I was meant to be wowed. I was not wowed.

Eventually, someone else was pulled into his gust of garrulous vapidity. The music had by this point degraded to an assault of ’80s pop hits. This girl, the new arrival, did not allow me the quick exit I was hoping for. Instead I was caught in a strange crossfire of The Antenna hitting on her, all the while keeping up his desperately trite narrative of TV-brain-rot with me. This would result in lengthy asides (during which the emphatic shoulder grab would reappear) where he would try and amuse her with what I assume were his best recollections of various true crime headlines. None of them were very entertaining, and in all honesty, I quite wished he could get to the end of his tirade sooner rather than later. The girl did leave, finally (what I’d do for that confidence, lady), but only after she and The Antenna shared a good minute or two of silent eye contact.

‘Dancing in the Moonlight’ was playing. His hand gripped my shoulder tightly. Christ. It was a little before this that his bullshit had outdone itself. He had begun to tie in a variety of statist conspiracies into his TV narrative – they’re behind it, he said loudly. They’re the ones making sure we all have a working set, he said even more loudly. His endgame was a kind of drone army of TV-infected slaves doing the government’s bidding or something. He even said something about them being faceless, but not like in a literary sense – literally faceless. Like in that episode of Doctor Who. On reflection, a lot like that episode of Doctor Who. I asked him if he’s seen it. Stupid question, no TV. That one’s on me. Then something truly inexplicable happened. Rodger Waters’ ‘Amused to Death’ blasted from the next room.

‘Finally, some real music.’ He skipped away, completely satisfied with how that conversation played out.

I finished the remnants of his fake-Kronenbourg and regretted it. What a waste of fucking time.

The Antenna has yet to get himself a UK release date, but you can watch the trailer below:

Does 3D only exist as a gimmick? Milo Garner dives into the history of 3D cinema, from Hitchcock’s Dial M for Murder to Peter Jackson’s They Shall Not Grow Old. 

For as long as 3D has existed, it has found itself to be a novelty, a gimmick of sorts. Its proliferation is more often a result of economic necessity than artistic inspiration, and that much is as true of today’s digital 3D as it was the 3D golden age of the 1950s. These two worlds converged in the most recent exploitation of 3D’s novelty. In partnership with Rio Cinema and Little White Lies, MUBI presented Hitchcock’s Dial M for Murder in its original 3D form – part filmic curiosity, part advertisement for their ongoing Hitchcock season. I found its effect striking, though not in any way Hitchcock might have conceived. The film itself does not seem initially to lend itself to the 3D format – it is set almost entirely within one room, unfolding more like a filmed play than the more outrageously experiential cinema that 3D tends to accompany. Only twice does an element onscreen protrude outwards from the frame, and only once is this effect particularly powerful.

Robert Burk’s cinematography functions better in creating depth, with a low-angled camera shooting past various obstacles, and images composed with the z-axis clearly in mind. Rather than allowing any deepening of the story or its suspense, this mode has the remarkable effect of opening the past. The aesthetic of 1950s cinema, usually locked in a 2D plane, is made expansive and, despite the overt artificiality suggested by 3D cinema, alive. Almost as though you could peer past the corners, seeing beyond the purview of plot and progression; an absorbing simulacrum of another time. More than a unique manner of viewing 1950s cinema, the 3D permits a profound experience of history, recreating a space in its x, y, and z-axes in a decade otherwise rendered flat.

But why was Dial M for Murder made in 3D to begin with? Its creator hated the format, and it hardly acts in direct service to the plot or aesthetic. This question ties into the history of 3D cinema more generally, a novelty that has existed for near as long as moviemaking in general. The first 3D explosion, as it might be termed, came in Germany in the early 1910s. This “pseudo-binocular” 3D did not require stereoscopy or anaglyphs, or any glasses at all. Instead it exploited the Pepper’s ghost illusion, an optical trick still in use today to resurrect stars of yesteryear onstage (mislabelled as “holographic” in a cheap marketing ploy). This illusion removed the screen entirely, projecting images against two glass panes resulting in their phantasmal appearance before an audience.

An innovation of August Engelsmann, the idea was then capitalized on by Oskar Messter, who built a series of cinemas specifically for this type of film. These ‘Alabastras’ were structured as a theatre, with house lights left up and an open stage fitted with all the appropriate décor. Ironically, it was in recreating theatre that 3D found its first major commercial boon, with actors projected under this new proscenium arch, their performances recorded for perpetuity. While staginess is a quality now used to denigrate cinema, not least Dial M for Murder, Messter had found a way to marry the two mediums in such a way as to transcend their ontological limitations. Both the exclusivity and transitory nature of theatre, and the disembodiment and separation of cinema were, at once, defeated. Actors would even bow and return for encores after their performances, though one critic found this somewhat perturbing: “Nothing struck me with as much amazement as these people foolishly returning for applause that was not given.”

But other limitations proved more troublesome for this early innovation. The nature of Alabastras and of the 3D illusion restricted the films to theatrical reenactments, which were then generally limited to a single reel to avoid further technological issues. These largely surrounded the use of colour (the films were hand-coloured after shooting) and synchronized sound, which became unfeasible across multiple reels. As fascinating as a sound, colour, and 3D film might seem for the early 1910s, especially considering the silent monochrome that would come to define the era and the decade proceeding, this was simply one novelty among many. The saturation of single-reel films demanded innovation, and the innovation to best succeed was the silent multi-reel narrative picture. While this format now seems a given in filmmaking, it was once one of many new methods of visual storytelling in competition.

Despite the decline and disappearance of this early 3D genre of moviemaking (that is, until very recently), many of the ideas surrounding it become particularly pertinent when considering 3D as a manner of experiencing history. An enthusiastic Hanns Heiz Ewers predicted at the time, “Exactly the same performance with all the best artists will be seen in the smallest backwater town in exactly the same way as Berlin, London or Paris.” For him, it was not only that these performances were recorded, but that they were then replicated in the exact same manner. These films did not use creative angles or closeups, but preferred single takes that would recreate the effect of the theatre, and so that same theatrical experience in the audience. This is not the immersive cinema of the imaginarium that 3D so often courts now, but its very opposite – a cinema self-aware of its environment, an impossible (and obvious) illusion. It doesn’t invite its audience into the screen – there was no screen at all – but shares a space with them: a direct experience of history.

Other than occasional dips into the world of 3D (notably John Norling’s 1939 New Dimensions, later rereleased as Motor Rhythm), the format was to remain largely dormant until the early 1950s. Once again, a crisis of cinema invited it back into the mainstream: television had recently taken the United States by storm, and the result was catastrophic for the film industry. From 1946 to 1952, weekly cinema attendance dropped from 83 million to 46 million, and studios were scrambling for something to differentiate the big screen from the small. One solution was to make the screen bigger – Cinerama, a process that projected three aligned frames to create a widescreen effect, emerged in 1952 to rapturous crowds. It would be later rendered obsolete by the cheaper and more artistically viable CinemaScope (which used anamorphic lenses to create a single, wider frame), but not before another challenger emerged. Two months after Cinerama’s startling debut came Bwana Devil, a film as exploitative as its title suggests. Its poster loudly declares, “A LION in your lap! A LOVER in your arms!” It would be this film that ushered in a flurry of 3D filmmaking.

Being cheaper than both Cinerama and CinemaScope, 3D projection was quickly adopted in many cinemas across the US, and production of 3D films quickly followed, with some forty-six 3D features released from 1952 to 1955. This sudden popularity was the reason for Dial M being 3D – Warner Brothers would not allow it to be made any other way. Many of the initial (and most of the total) 3D films made were quickies completed in 11 to 18 days, with the larger budgeted films only appearing later – but this first impression was not easily shaken. 3D quickly became synonymous with cheapness and gimmickry, and waning enthusiasm was met by falling standards in movie houses. Poor projection, cheap glasses, and dim image quality could render a 3D movie far more trouble that it was worth. While a handful of notable films in the format did emerge, such as Inferno, Gun Fury, and The House of Wax (the last two ironically by one-eyed directors), it quickly fell into disrepute; so much so that Dial M for Murder (and various other films shot in 3D) would be released “flat” (bar its initial four performances), only regaining its original z-axis in a 1979 rerelease.

The quick-spun gimmickry of 3D might be familiar for many, given we are currently living through the decline of 3D’s second golden age in Hollywood, again born from cinema’s waning popularity against the still-burgeoning home media industry. While often used in contemporary action films, 3D has again failed to become a new standard for cinematic expression, in the way artificial lighting, sound, colour, widescreen, and now digital filmmaking have all succeeded. The reasons for this are myriad, and it perhaps links, again, to its limitations as a tool for narrative storytelling.

While 3D has always functioned in its immersive effects – and thus found regular use in IMAX documentaries and theme parks since the 1970s – it typically offers little within the standard paradigms of narrative cinema. Additionally, it is not effective enough to warp those paradigms significantly, as sound markedly did in the late 1920s. As Werner Herzog puts it, “You can shoot a porno film in 3D, but you cannot film a romantic comedy in 3D.” So, aside from the action extravaganzas of James Cameron and Peter Jackson (probably the most significant innovators in the technology), should 3D be consigned again to the novelty bin? We might adopt André Bazin’s stance from the 1950s, in which he said with some prescience, “Outside of certain specific themes (like horror, precisely) the third dimension adds nothing essential to the action of flat cinema, and it brings with it in return some real inconveniences.”

A quintet of filmmakers offer an alternative, if not completely, to Bazin’s disparaging. The first is the abovementioned James Cameron. While Avatar has lately been denigrated in almost every aspect of its construction – its trite narrative, hollow characters, bland aesthetic, and absolute failure to impact popular culture in any way proportional to the initial frenzy it provoked – one element largely free from censure is its use of 3D. This can partially be explained in its prescient position in terms of digital 3D cinema – the 3D of Bwana Devil no doubt also benefitted from its novelty at the time. But there is also a sense that, more than so many who have attached themselves to this novelty thereafter, Cameron better understood the format, and put far more thought to its realization.

In response to an early moment in the film wherein someone jumps out of the screen, Cameron said, “I just did that so they would know I know how to do it. But then I stopped doing it because that’s not what 3D is; 3D is bringing the audience completely into the environment of the movie.” His sensibilities stand opposite Bwana Devil; that was a film that played up to the gimmicky potential of 3D, while Cameron is instead reserved, grounding his use of 3D in spatial and immersive terms. His 3D seems intrinsically linked to his vision of the landscape of Pandora; just like I felt able to peek round the corners of Dial M for Murder, so too does Cameron feel it apposite for one to feel the contours of his imaginary world. Where the 3D of many popular action films (consider Marvel’s output, and the like) feels disposable, more an obligatory glaze than a considered artistic decision, Avatar remains striking.

Another early adopter of digital 3D for whom narrative vision and 3D seem to overlap is Robert Zemeckis. In his 2015 The Walk – a film of forgettable substance – he exploits 3D to wring yet more suspense out of its climactic sequence, in which French high-wire artist Phillipe Petit must walk the line between the World Trade Center buildings (whose digital reconstruction is entirely convincing in these scenes, another virtual vision of the past). Here the effect becomes essential to the filmmaking, inducing a genuine vertigo in audiences and reflecting the direct experience of the protagonist. While these could and perhaps should be considered as examples of specific genres in which 3D can work, as per Bazin’s limitation, they contradict the idea of 3D being pure novelty; cinematic purpose beyond empty spectacle can be derived.

But more convincing yet might be to expand the purview of 3D beyond genre filmmaking. This expansion is provided by two greats of German New Cinema, still pioneering late into their careers. Wim Wenders’ Pina (2011) is an exploration of space and movement, a film about dance that considers 3D a necessary cinematic tool in capturing this medium through cinema. Wenders was conflicted with a formal dilemma – if he shot the dancers close, he would miss much of their background and context, bar the use of distracting and abstract montage. If he shot them far, the dynamism of their dance would be lost to the flatness of frame. The solution was found in 3D, through which he could shoot from a distance while retaining the spatial dynamics at play. He said of the format: “3D really thrives on space – the 3D camera loves infinity, the horizon.” He continues, “It’s a shame the 3D most people have seen wasn’t shot in the real world but in the studios, because it’s in the real world where 3D really comes into its own.” In contrast to the grandiosity of Cameron or Zemeckis, Wenders sees the utility of 3D in capturing reality as opposed to using it to construct a new one.

This approach is met by Werner Herzog, who released his Cave of Forgotten Dreams a year prior. Another documentary, this film is perhaps the ultimate contradiction to the style of educational film with which 3D is usually associated. Instead of soaring through the cosmos or delving the deeps, Herzog instead focuses on stationary drawings in the Chauvet Cave, using the world’s newest art form to capture its very oldest. He believed “this film [to be] the only 3D film where [he] really [knew] it was imperative to do it in 3D,” suggesting that to truly experience this ancient art one must feel and appreciate the way the walls bend and contour; sense the sacred space of the cave. In many ways this harkens back to the 3D cinema of the 1910s, which hoped to share and recreate a tactile experience – not one to immerse per se, but to replicate a known and distant reality. A BBC report seemingly recognizes this, reading in regard to Wenders’ and Herzog’s films: “[3D] opens the door to expensive art forms for the price of a cinema ticket” and “gives people the opportunity to see this beautiful and timeless content in areas of the world where they would never have the opportunity.” If not for its British reserve, this praise would read as an almost verbatim repetition of Ewers’ prediction a hundred years prior.

A synthesis of these two extremes – Hollywood spectacle and German artistry – might be found in Peter Jackson, whose most recent project is a meeting of the two. They Shall Not Grow Old is a documentary that has left many a film archivist aghast; not only does Jackson controversially sonorize and colour silent monochrome footage from the First World War, he also applies a 3D effect. His purpose is to bring the past closer to the present; as much as monochrome is an accurate artefact of the past, it is also distinctly unreal and potentially alienating. The same could be supposed of a flat image. Says Jackson, “I wanted to reach through the fog of time and pull these men into the modern world, so they can regain their humanity once more.”

The counterarguments are immediately evident: Jackson’s efforts are effectively desecration, and almost entirely fictitious. The film stock used to capture the First World War is orthochromatic, meaning that while sensitive to greens and blues, it lacks red, requiring any colouring work to be assumption rather than revelation. So too are these photos not taken with 3D cameras, the result a slew of guesswork. Any indexical “truth” that these photos may convey about the First World War, those who took them, and those who are subjects, is wiped immediately from the frame. It is almost as falsified as a direct reenactment of events.

Writing for Sight & Sound, Luke McKernan even goes so far as to suggest that by colouring these images, we are actually alienating ourselves further from the past by directly suggesting that the black and white pictures are beyond personal relation. But in that same article he provides an adequate defence: “Film is not reality, but a reflection of reality. Overlaying it with colour is only a further treatment of that reflection of reality, a way of looking at the past rather than the pretence of being the past itself.” As such, Jackson’s work is one of fiction, but one that uses archival footage in order to create – and “create” is the apposite term – a more tactile vision of the past. His use of 3D is not so distinct from Herzog’s in theory, in that it suggests a space can be better experienced and understood if granted a sense of visual depth. It is not a film that should stand in place of the artefacts on which it is based, but rather alongside, sacrificing literal truth for a more direct connectivity, as cinema so often does.

For me, this leads right back to Dial M for Murder, at least in its effect. Even though it was not intended to be so, it now functions as a kind of document, whereby the mundanity of its setting is offered fresh interest by the format of its capture. So if limited to a certain kind of genre film in narrative filmmaking, 3D perhaps holds greater stock in documentary, wherein the function of parallax can become less a spectacle and more an emphasis of reality – a sense of “being there,” experiencing something directly and uninterrupted by the limitations of technology. While 3D effects that penetrate the frame often encourage the unreality of the cinematic space – for something leaving the frame to be remarkable, the frame’s existence must be acknowledged – those that do not can serve the opposite function. The moving camera has always had the effect of suggesting a world beyond the borders of the frame, far more than painting or theatre, for which the absolute nature of the frame often becomes inherent in the art itself. 3D exploited in the manner of the above filmmakers does not contradict this fact, and if used effectively, can deepen it immensely. The 3D revolution may not be coming, but its poor reputation certainly deserves reappraisal.

Milo Garner dives into the medieval in cinema and Outlaw King’s position in its genre. 

What does the medieval look like on film? While this question suggests a great variety of responses, a cursory glance at mainstream medieval cinema defies any such conclusion. The main mode, one adopted by the likes of Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven and Robin Hood, or Peter Flinth’s Arn – The Knight Templar, is that of almost docu-fiction. Considerable efforts are put into what Robert Rosenstone calls ‘reality effects’, elements of production design that replicate what we know of the past; an attempt to resurrect what has long passed. As according to this philosophy, the filmmaking itself is rarely daring, always preferring a sense of the real. ‘Sense’ being the operative word here – as much as these films seek to replicate the past visually, they often forgo such shackles in their storytelling. Kingdom of Heaven’s Balian is presented as the perfect knight, other than that he’s a philanderer (permissive now, but a mortal sin then); Robin Hood’s French invaders land on the beaches like the soldiers of D-Day; the eponymous Arn appears as the rare Christian knight utterly bereft of prejudice against his Muslim foemen. The result is a bizarre mismatch of visual acuity and narrative anachronism, the supposed conclusion being that this ‘sense’ of the medieval is of far more importance than an embodiment of the time, its norms, its vagaries.

This anachronism need not seem so contrary to the otherwise clear efforts for ‘accuracy’ (a claim that has been attached to all three of the above films by their publicists). To consider another vision of the medieval, Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal seems a useful analogue. This is a film almost defined by its anachronism – in terms of content, it features a Crusade to the Holy Land, Flagellants, the Black Death, and the persecution of witches as contemporaneous events, despite these phenomena being separated by centuries. Even more troubling might be its philosophical core, which delves to the recesses of nihilism – a 20^th century philosophy with no grounding in the god-fearing past. Yet these contradictions of historical record do not render The Seventh Seal a poorer representation of the past than the films abovementioned, but rather combine into a far more effective communication of that period and its anxieties. Through contemporary atheistic philosophizing, Bergman presents a world defined by fear and suffering, one in which the plague stalked and superstition reigned. Antonius Block almost serves as a modern man wandering through a tableau of the Middle Ages, experiencing an expressionistic collage of their struggles through a lens the audience may be more familiar with. Instead of sanitizing the past, Bergman exploits its thematic potential – the result is a story that both informs the past and present in equal measure.

But even this might seem dissatisfactory, as to use the medieval experience to contextualize the modern experience one must undoubtedly corrupt its character in a direct sense, as Bergman has clearly done. František Vláčil presents a further alternative, his Marketa Lazarová delivering a sense of the medieval far more directly. Instead of considering his subjects in a way that might relate them to an audience, Vláčil instead engages with an expressive, even avant-garde manner of filmmaking. His medieval Bohemia is non-specific in date, a vagueness permeating its whole; Vláčil sees the medieval as strange and distant, fearsome and chaotic. He envisions the encroachment of Christianity into polytheist lands, the story (adapted from Vladislav Vančura’s novel of the same name) embracing a grim brutality totally removed from even Bergman’s bleak imagination. Understanding the medieval cannot rely on the simple recreation of past events, supposes Vláčil, but must instead somehow represent something of the medieval mindset, replicate how these ancient people might perceive their own realities. A question of texture over content.

Aleksei German’s Hard to be a God seems to be an ultimate answer to this question. While technically a sci-fi picture set on a distant planet, one far less advanced than our own, the film is essentially set in an equivalent of the Middle Ages. German’s filmmaking almost entirely disposes with narrative, instead focusing on a feeling of the medieval; despite its monochromatic arthouse veneer, it feels as though it should be seen in 3D on the biggest screen possible. Every frame drips with unsettling detail, with blood and unnamed fluids, with an almost visual stench. Filth and dirt seem to envelop everything, violence and misery never far from centre-frame. In one sense Robin Hood is by far the better representation of the past – its dates are correct, its characters are largely real, it is set on Earth. But while entirely fictional in detail and content, Hard to be a God nonetheless suggests a physical texture that Scott’s film doesn’t even attempt to convey.

Outlaw King’s position in this environment isn’t entirely straightforward, but for the most part it sits squarely within the first paragraph. Its set design and period details are well realized, and while its events and characters may be morphed, they are also a recognizable reflection of reality. Its hero, Chris Pine’s Robert the Bruce, becomes much like Orlando Bloom’s Balian in Kingdom of Heaven – a gormless and hopelessly bland embodiment of the hero template, a man who we must support for his doing the right thing, and nothing more. The brutality of the Middle Ages is not shrugged off, but it is also held in visible contempt. Robert the Bruce is better than this, and he fights for this betterment. His mission to “free” Scotland from the English is never granted much context (for all its bullshit – historical and otherwise – Mel Gibson’s Braveheart at least established proper character motivations), instead leaving the viewer to simply suppose he is doing the right thing. The film leaves little room for anything else. This progression is complicated by the film’s own adherence to certain historical events, however. In his largely passive drift through the Scottish wastes, one of Robert’s sole direct actions is the stark murder of a rival claimant in a church (which carries poor connotations now, but then would be a whole other bag of beans). This action the creates a new contradiction – the brutalism of the medieval mindset meeting the romanticized hero narrative of David Mackenzie’s film.

Had Mackenzie considered this action critically it might be more permissible – perhaps Robert had no other option, or perhaps more intriguingly, his ambition for the crown outweighed the clear immorality presented before him. Or both. But instead of a more rigorous examination of the past as per Bergman, or a more expressive (and as such, detached) observation of distant savagery, Mackenzie instead decides to offer a scene of a repentant Robert and then resume the narrative of a romantic king, one who refuses to sleep with his arranged wife after marriage (an unsubstantiated anachronism), and one who will almost botch his bid for the crown in a seemingly idiotic appeal to chivalry, falling foul of a night attack by the English. This second event is particularly interesting as it is, at least in concept, accurate to history. But without prior knowledge of exactly how a medieval king might perceive the world, it seems both foolish and contradictory to his earlier behaviour; any potential for intrigue or interest in Mackenzie’s narrative is lost to the strange marriage of modern morality and historical (mis)detail that so consumed Kingdom of Heaven and its ilk.

Even beyond its conceptual strangeness, Outlaw King fails in its filmic construction. Despite being twenty minutes shorter than its Toronto cut (and a good two hours from the original assembly), it is a film beset by a constant stream of redundant or featureless scenes. It has a romantic subplot which falls out of the narrative (only to return for a saccharine beach-meet finale), a whole slew of wandering-through-Scotland shots, and a distinct lack of substantial character motivations. A few are granted surface objectives, such as Douglas the Black’s mission to reclaim his family lands, but these are so thinly detailed that they are difficult to fully invest in. This isn’t to mention the inter-character relationships, whereby only two distinct relationships can be considered in any way developed. First, Robert and Elizabeth’s, and then King Edward and his son. In fact, the dynamic between the English royals, however simple, might be the only engaging element among the film’s long slew of faces. That, along with the film’s best image – a shot of the young Edward mid-battle cry, a dead swan held by the neck in each hand. Perhaps one of the few elements that felt entirely medieval in a textural sense, reserved to demonize a villain. And I suppose this is where Outlaw King stumbles most as a medieval film – instead of presenting a king that is part of a medieval world, it presents one who seems at odds with it.

To present Outlaw King as wholly negative would, however, be disingenuous. Beyond its impressive production values, the film very much embraces a sense of spectacle that is often reserved for the medieval genre. Its first shot is very much an example of this, a swirling and intensely choreographed long-take that encompasses Robert pledging fealty to Edward, duelling his son, and then witnessing the firing of a trebuchet at a distant castle. The shot functions as a sort of microcosm of the larger film, and effectively lays out Mackenzie’s ideas with an elegance that is never resumed in the two hours or so that remain. Also well realized is the final battle, a grisly and blood-soaked engagement that manages to coax a stirring climax from a film otherwise so desperately limp. Like that first shot, it’ll probably get better play on YouTube than Netflix, but perhaps that’s for the best.

Outlaw King is currently available to stream on Netflix. It is also released limitedly in UK cinemas. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Peter Jackson’s technically and visually experimental WW1 documentary. 

Among the unruly film conservationist community – an elusive and underloved subsection of society at the best of times – there is much discontent afoot. Peter Jackson’s latest project, a commission from the Imperial War Museum to mark the centenary of the First World War’s conclusion, has been considered by some to be an act of barbarity, an unjustifiable marring of historical record for the sake of empty titillation. This project, entitled They Shall Not Grow Old, is understandably controversial: Jackson has taken archive footage from the Western Front and not only colourized it, but dubbed it with sound and rendered it in 3D. That’s not even to mention blowing up 4:3 to 16:9, often considered a sin in its own right.

The arguments against this kind of treatment are plentiful and not without merit, especially the suggestion that in making these images more ‘realistic’, one forgets that they do not necessarily represent reality at all. Not only is much of the footage used staged or in some way manipulated – what is off-frame is often more indicative than what is on – but also an artefact of how these historical people viewed their own present. To ‘enhance’ these images with tools of modernity might, in an extreme example, not be so dissimilar to colouring in cave drawings in order to make the horses more lifelike. While yes, that much would be achieved, it would also be a total distortion of the way in which early man perceived and recorded horses – it may seem more real to us, but not in any helpful way.

This angle, while entirely valid, misses the aims of Jackson in creating this film. He is not attempting to make better the images of his forefathers, but rather to use the data contained within those images so as to construct a fantasy that might, itself, communicate an idea of the First World War. Little of what Jackson presents can be considered ‘real’ – the colours are imagined, the sounds invented, the voices guessed at – but just like any costume drama set in the Great War, that does not stop these from being authentic. By adapting the indexical record of the First World War, which even if staged or manipulated is still constructed with genuine soldiers in genuine locations, Jackson can then inject this impression of the past with his own expressive interpretation. This is not an improvement of old footage so much as an attempt to use this footage in an essentially fictional recreation of the First World War. He wishes to recreate it according to the aesthetic of direct human senses – we see in colour, we hear synchronised sound, we perceive depth. So too did the soldiers Jackson wishes to depict, and through their eyes he attempts to see. This is, of course, impossible – therein lies the art of cinema.

But does it work? In large part, I think it does. Jackson opens the film with framed and untouched (besides the unobtrusive addition of mild 3D effects) footage depicting recruitment and preparation early in the war. As this leads into the fighting – he structures the film in a simplistic, linear fashion – the various effects sweep over the screen. The impact is at first startling; the distortion inherent in the footage met with image smoothing techniques, and occasionally garish colours, initially suggests the tone of 80s video footage, almost as though we are viewing some kind of re-enactment. But as the film continues the imagery becomes more consistent, and at once more intimate. This is not to say that black-and-white footage is inherently alienating; rather that to see these young faces laughing or speaking, smiling in impossible close-ups, is to imbue them with something lost in the limitations of silent documentary of the 1910s. It feels almost wrong – especially as a student of history – to suggest such a superficial (and fictitious) adaptation of old images can change their effect in any meaningful way. Then again it is that replication of the human sensory condition, and application of modern aesthetic sensibilities, that in Jackson’s own words ‘reach[es] through the fog of time and pull[s] these men into the modern world’.

Unfortunately this fascinating gambit lies in contrast to the worn-over and school-friendly structure the rest of the film rests in (albeit understandably, given a copy will be sent to every school in the UK). Every theme is covered individually, each given a few minutes, the course of the war covered in as wide and generic a sense as possible. While the interviews that underscore the entire film are of course specific, they are rent from their direct context so as to allow them the bizarre position of ‘general anecdote’. The wheres and the whens are forgone for the general atmosphere of war. This is justifiable, but feels rote, and paradoxically impersonal. Jackson will often cut to close-ups of soldiers faces to directly humanize them, and yet these soldiers will remain anonymous, matched to voices that are not their own, intercut with battles in which they did not fight. As associative montage this might be effective, but it does seem a little at odds with Jackson’s initial purpose. This also leads to Jackson’s trouble when representing scenes of battle in a larger sense, as the exact kind of grittiness he would like to impart was never captured (or archived) on film, other than the grisly leftovers. As such he must fall back on printed images of battle, with a ballistic soundscape of artillery fire and the occasional bagpipe standing in for visual effect. A conspicuously absent feature given its core importance to understanding the experience of war, even if the descriptions on the soundtrack serve as adequate substance in lieu.

They Shall Not Grow Old is, as such, a strange contradiction of sorts. As a documentary, it is entirely uninspiring in form, and other than its brief treatment of the post-war experience it offers little novel in terms of structure. But the direct experience of witnessing these soldiers resurrected by digital technologies rebukes any loss in confidence instantly. To see these men looking so immediately real (the footage not only colourized, but stabilized, and smoothed) is startling. While the black-and-white footage untreated could hardly be described as inhuman, it has previously served as a unique sort of cage for the men of the early 20^th century. Where wars of deeper history lack such filmic record – and so are simply imagined in colour, inspired by clearly contrived elements of visual art (paintings etc.) – the nature of film is such that these monochrome images become a sort of phantom memory for those recalling these battles beyond their years. It is in much the same manner that young children often wonder if the past was in black-and-white entirely. And it is for these children especially that the film has been constructed; it aims to break this silver cage, and create a new, vivid, memory of the past. In this it undoubtedly succeeds.

7/10

They Shall Not Grow Old is currently showing at the Imperial War Museum. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner dives into Godard’s newest experimental video essay.

Early in The Image Book, Jean-Luc Godard splices in a sound clip regarding musician Scott Walker and his late-period reinvention, whereby the pop singer from the ’60s reemerged in the 2000s as a dark and experimental figure in music’s underground. This is then followed by a segment called ‘remakes’, in which Godard flicks through his favourite films and finds them within each other, and in the world. Does Godard see himself as another Scott Walker, famed for his old jollities, now focused on the business of the dense and the dingy? Without a doubt. Much of The Image Book follows a similar mode, effectively a sort of JLG clip show, albeit edited with abrasion in mind. Images are constantly distorted, their aspect ratios abused, their colours blown out or digitally assaulted. As much as Godard is a self-avowed cinema obsessive, he is thankfully free of any ritualistic worship of original form. He bends and tears and cuts without pause, even more in his late 80s than in his days as a burgeoning enfant terrible.

This isn’t to say his attack on form is constantly engaging or interesting. An image will sometimes shudder, or the screen will go blank, or in a trick that seems especially favoured for its repetition, the audio will spring about the cinema, elements of the mix cutting out constantly. The effect is often more frustrating than intriguing or exciting. He withholds subtitles, which I suspect is less to favour the image (as Straub-Hulliet dictated) so much as it is to restrict viewers who can speak only English. Godard has always resisted the ever-antiquated capabilities of subtitles (the walls of La Chinoise are covered in words and details that an English speaker has no chance of picking up), but in this case his resistance seems especially contrived. If the intention is to front the image, why withhold subtitles when the screen is entirely blank? I feel he reveals his hand in a moment where subtitles are provided, despite words not being spoken: the joke is very much on us.

Following Godard’s exploration of cinema-as-cinema-as-reality-as-cinema, he becomes particularly set on the Middle East. First, his concern seems political: the revolutionary fervour that has defined much of Godard’s work is perennial, and he wastes no time in criticizing not just global foreign policy, but the inadequacies of creeping and total capitalism. But more pertinent to his consideration of the ‘image’ is in his vague screeds on representation. His conclusions are largely surface level, but he hits on an interesting point when considering the violence of these representations in process against their calmness in content. Many fanciful renditions of the Middle East are not directly malicious, but to trace their creation and origin is a trail tread with blood. Godard seems aware of this, and though his argumentation might be considered nebulous at best, it might further be supposed that his narration is at least secondary in this film, the flood of imagery its guiding light.

This point can then bend back to the idea of remakes in the film’s initial segment. What is the original, and what is the copy? Do Arab representations of the self reflect better their realities, or already extant representations of their supposed realities as according to the West? And furthermore, is the contemporary Arab reality not also a product of Western influence and representation? Godard negotiates a controversial territory here, always risking partaking in the very Orientalism he critiques. When questioning the Arab ability to resist Western cultural hegemony, is he himself falling victim to the trope of the supplicatory Arab? To quote the man himself – ‘can the Arabs speak?’ The film leaves me with many questions, and for good reason – but if nothing else it provides an interesting diversion that suggests the mirror-maze of images is not only influenced by the real world, but also is itself an influence.

Together with its countless other diversions, tricks, and misdirections (the credits are totally jumbled, just for fun), The Image Book invites interpretation and dissection at every turn. But this doesn’t necessarily mean it is in any way rigorous – if constructed with some sense for progression, it prefers free association to a more structured unpacking of ideas. Godard seems caught between explicating ideas and destroying the cinema, and here finds himself somewhere between. The result can sometimes be fascinating from a formal standpoint, but it just as often falls into the needlessly abrasive or argumentatively directionless. The Image Book is provoking and occasionally amusing without a doubt, but it is also a film whose anarchic foundations seem at odds with its intellectual constructions a little too often.

5/10

The Image Book (Le livre d’image) had its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival. It has yet to acquire a general UK release date. Check out the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Mike Leigh’s vivid historical war drama on the 1819 massacre.

Peterloo opens with what many consider Britain’s greatest triumph – the battle of Waterloo. But Mike Leigh does not shoot the flag triumphant, nor Wellington on horseback, nor Wellington at all. Instead he finds a single soldier, frightened in the mud and cannon fire. He is a boy barely twenty, it would seem, bewildered and afraid, experiencing less a victory than a trauma. Leigh’s lens is, as usual for his filmography, set low. He cares little for the largesse of war and battle in favour of prioritising a man caught in its fury, unwilling and unknowing of its full context or import. He doesn’t bend or distort history for his purposes – his presentation of events is remarkably and admirably accurate – but rather presents it in such a manner that it becomes a protest incidentally, both against the way history is remembered and the state of politics in the modern day.

The climax of the film is the massacre after which it is named – the result of a cavalry charge into the then-largest public gathering in Mancunian history during the August of 1819. But before this event of brutal and needless violence is dramatized, Leigh goes to extreme lengths to contextualise and frame it, and grant it meaning further than simple outrage at clear injustice. His manner has been criticised as laboured or repetitive, but I see it rather as a thorough, full-bodied reading of events that would make Rossellini proud. The multitudes of public meetings, for example, do not differ greatly in content or direction. But they do suggest not only a tactile increase in support, but the way in which bread-and-butter issues can inflate and contort at the behest of certain charismatic individuals. We see various orators rattle against one another, from the measured pragmatism of John Knight to the near-Biblical radicalism of John Johnston. Crowds who would never otherwise give Johnston an ear are now swept up in his rhetoric; the lack of basic provision permits unnecessary extremism to take hold. It is in this basic presentation of historical fact that Leigh can comment on the present, and there is a certain elegance to his method.

This is seen again during his time spent with the women’s reform movement, in which a largely middle-class crowd get so lost in their refined prose that their working-class supporters are literally unable to understand what exactly it is they’re saying. This is especially pertinent, and Leigh’s emphasis on it is obvious; so much left-wing intellectualism supposedly for (and to be actualised by) the working classes is written beyond their means, or obfuscated needlessly through the black hole of academia. Again, history is in no way mangled by this emphasis, nor is this a case of twisting a narrative out of shape to fit a pre-existent agenda. Rather Leigh finds and presents parallels without altering their original context in any way.

But it is in the women’s reform movement we also see a good example of Leigh’s version of history, very much eschewing the top down approach that pervades even modern historical readings. While admitting great amounts of time to the notable characters of nineteenth century Manchester, Leigh never loses sight of that boy at Waterloo and his kin. This family grounds the story, and maintains a human interest that so many similar historical epics do away with in the name of scale and grandeur. This is naturally furthered by Leigh’s greatest strength – character work. Even the minor roles are granted an instant personality by his intricate method, Leigh often working for months with actors, preferring natural interaction to overly scripted dialogue. The result is often slightly caricatured, a mild exaggeration of a familiar reality, but never in a way that makes these people feel unreal or obscene, at least not among the central cast. Some are intentionally exuberant, not least the vainglorious would-be poet Reverend Etlhelson, but these characters serve to ornament the film’s selvedge with a personality that the historical genre often rejects for the sake of supposed authenticity. Such a grave and important event need not be cloaked in the prestigious guise that covers the likes of Lincoln or similar – it is through warmth and comedy that the story can engage rather than alienate, especially when so stringent with historical detail otherwise.

As such Peterloo is something so many grim-up-north films are not – vivid. Dick Pope’s bright cinematography matches the performances in its agreeable tenor, and is joined by production design that eschews a focus on mud and dirt (present though they are) for the brightness of industrial England, not least the various flags taken to St Peter’s Field on the day of the march. I find it equally vivid in its telling of history, too, though this might be a more specific interest. It evokes its period beautifully and conjures up various familiar figures with fresh vigour. Even very minor characters, such as George IV’s brief appearance, are memorable. That it can then propagate a rounded and faithful account of events without leaving any of its audience behind – as according to its own criticism – makes it a doubly attractive proposal.

This is almost certainly a film that will, at some point, be played in school, likely across an entire month owing to its gargantuan length. It is for much the same reason I imagine some might find it off putting, as much a drama as it is a lesson, concerned with fact as much as with human emotion, rather than offering the latter a significant advantage as would be usual practice. But I feel Leigh finds a perfect blend. The obsession with history that Rossellini fell into but without the ascetic tone; instead Leigh has managed to meld into this his inimitable and welcoming style. A vague exaggeration, perhaps, but a fair compromise by all accounts. Peterloo is beautifully crafted, immediately compelling, and deeply sincere – another success from one of Britain’s finest directors.

8/10

Peterloo will be released in the UK on November 2nd. Check out the trailer below: 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner takes a look at the upcoming anticipated remake of the 1977 Italian horror.

Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria is in some ways very much like the original. A familiar face in the cast, a quotation of Goblin’s soundtrack, references in the production design. But in a more important sense it is dissimilar, a different proposition entirely. Argento’s original is writhed in giallo style, a film that feels intermittently cheap before arresting its audience with sudden gore, or red, or blue, or some combination of colours that had never even occurred to them. A wonder of garish production design and lighting, it was never a film whose script was especially intelligent, acting more as a framework for its vibrant delights than anything more.

Guadagnino has repositioned his version considerably. Now it enters the curious realm of the prestige horror, defined not only by their substantial budgets but their supposed restraint. The ropey audio and self-conscious comedy of the 1977 Suspiria have no place here, replaced by a sense of importance and magnitude. This is not a film to scare or enthral for its own sake, as I consider much of Argento’s output to be, but a more capital-A Artistic endeavour, seeking for plaudits it will most assuredly attract (from a few, at least). The most obvious consequence comes in colour, with lurid replaced by desaturated. Set in Cold War Berlin, a grey seeps over everything; this follows narratively, with constant updates on the German Autumn then embroiling the city.

This setting serves as the film’s most interesting distraction, wherein it considers the impact of a city so wounded. In Berlin, an evil hid behind innocent walls was not an abstract concept; Nazism lurked close in memory, remnants ready to creep through the cracks. In this atmosphere of suspicion and depression, the wild ramblings of a dancer suddenly take on extra meaning, an extra disquiet. Dr. Klemperer (an unrecognisable Tilda Swinton) offers curious insight on this point, reading her diary filled with witches and covens as code. An attempt to understand some horror otherwise inconceivable, a way to process a world bent out of shape. This idea fascinated me – the suggestion that deeds so repulsive could conjure the existence of magic in the mind, if only to assure the subject that such evil could not exist amongst normal humanity. That it can exist there, and does, is a prospect far more unnerving than actual witches.

Unfortunately Suspiria only presents these ideas, but does not engage with, or even tease them narratively. We are very quickly introduced to the supernatural and its hosts, leaving Klemperer’s musings as just that, red herrings against a very real threat. But for all their twisted cruelties, the witches can never become particularly compelling villains due to both the obscurity of their aims and the willingness of their target. The mystery unravels almost in parallel, with Dakota Johnson’s Susie slipping from the picture at several intervals, and Mia Goth’s middling performance as Sara never quite suitable as a replacement. Sayombhu Mukdeeprom’s camera always maintains interest, but the narrative it captures – one far more intricate yet little more interesting than that of the 1977 film – rarely tantalises as the visuals do. The choreography and trance-like editing are left in a similar position; a film of brilliant craft, but lacking adequate direction in writing.

Never is this clearer than with Klemperer’s extended subplot, which seemingly develops from a minor investigative role to the film’s primary moment of pathos, leading to an epilogue that entirely misses the mark. It almost comes as a shock that he is a major character by the time he’s figuring closely in the central narrative; a bizarre misgiving, though perhaps understandable given his character’s distance from the film’s thematic middle. If other elements of the film were captivating in the way Argento’s film managed to be – on a purely experiential level – then these issues could be largely forgiven, but Guadagnino remains restrained until the finale is upon him, at which point the table flips so suddenly that it almost invites comedy. Not the intended effect, I would imagine, though I do appreciate a film for going absolutely nuts even if it isn’t entirely to my taste.

If to some degree flawed or misguided, Suspiria still tempts in process. Much of its imagery is impermeable, Thom Yorke’s ghostly soundtrack is forever alluring, and its ambition should be applauded. Performances, too, bar perhaps Goth and Moretz, are wonderfully realised throughout the cast, not least Tilda Swinton in her dual roles. Even if it doesn’t match the success of his last two pictures, Guadagnino again proves himself to be a force for innovation in cinema – a remarkable career lies ahead.

5/10

Suspiria will be generally released in the UK on November 16th. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Jean-Paul Civeyrac’s tribute to cinephile culture.  

A Paris Education is a reflexive film at its core, and one that only functions through a direct and intense self-contradiction starting at its mid-way point. The first half of the film plays like a sort of Eustache-Truffaut parody, only one severely lacking in parodic elements: it’s played completely straight. We follow Etienne (Andranic Manet) as he journeys to Paris to enrol in a film studies course; he is a self-professed cinephile who quickly finds himself influenced by the elusive Mathias (Corentin Fila), posited by the narrative as a mysterious guru figure. Mathias knows cinema, and knows it better than anyone else. He constantly laments the mainstream, he obsesses over the acknowledged masters (Dreyer, Ford, Vigo, et al.), and he is quick to harshly critique the works of his friends and colleagues. His cinematic philosophy appears to centre ‘truth’ – a vagary never offered any context or precise justification – and anything lacking should be rejected entirely.

Etienne is seduced by this rhetoric – perhaps literally, if the film didn’t both explicitly suggest Mathias might be homophobic while giving Etienne a constant string of beautiful lovers. But to read this film as a romance of that kind would be a mistake. Etienne doesn’t want to be with Mathias so much as he simply wants to be him. Etienne’s love is very much for the self, one that predicts himself as a great artist, and one that suggests he is better than his idiotic classmates so concerned with analysing ‘Z-list’ gialli rather than the intellectual cinema he supposedly prefers. And for a long time the film seems to agree with Etienne and his obsessions. It plays a little like a cineaste’s Deadpool, stacking references on references, a film that only functions if you’ve seen Bresson, Naruse, Parajanov, or whoever else gets a namedrop. At one point Etienne keys the fourth movement of Mahler’s 5^th on his piano, and I thought to myself (with some exasperation) that he’s probably playing it because it’s in Death in Venice. What I expected less was for him to announce this fact loudly moments later. By this point, the film has reached a peak of cinephillic obnoxity.

But around the middle-point it changes, and drastically at that. This is most clear at a reprisal of Mahler, Etienne’s friend playing it for company. Etienne gleefully suggests that it’s from a film, and that Annabelle (his then-love interest) probably knows which one. She doesn’t respond, either in ignorance, or more likely, because she doesn’t care. Suddenly, Etienne’s world-through-cinema is not presented as a wonderful life (hello), but as a hollow kind of in-joke. That his tastes in music are determined by his favourite movies is not so impressive to those beyond his clique, that his entire life is set around the cinema is nothing to be lauded. Annabelle later locks horns with Mathias, denigrating his ‘armchair life’. She suggests that this ‘truth’ he so seeks from cinema is itself only determined by the cinema he has seen. That he is trapped in a sort of causal loop, reflections of reflections. A harsh and accurate critique of those who live behind a screen and think themselves better for it.

This second half of the film then represents the breaking of the Mathias illusion as acknowledged in the diegesis. His ear-grating monologues on true cinema ring ever falser as he fails to justify his manner of being or belief. His taste more and more resembles a textbook from the 60s than it does the mind of an independent artist; he acknowledges he is old-fashioned, but to lament that the latest Verhoeven film is unlike Vigo or Ford seems a special kind of bluntheadedness, especially as his façade begins to crumble. So too does Etienne then unravel. His egotism becomes ever more apparent – at one point he laments to his friend that those who help great artists (said friend included) are never remembered like the greats themselves. He, of course, assumes himself a would-be great in this assessment. His relationships disintegrate around him, and his dependence on Mathias becomes less that of an acolyte than a pathetic hanger-on. The punchline comes when his short film is received poorly, his application to film school is rejected, and his feature is stalled in production. He simply isn’t as good as he came to believe he was.

This leads to what the film’s core idea might be. Behind the vainglory Etienne had constructed for himself, he was once an enthusiastic – and to an extent unpretentious – cinephile. He came to Paris with a film of his own (which he promptly destroys after shallow critique from Mathias) and presumably opinions of his own. But being in the city, receiving its eponymous ‘education’, his tastes and ideas are subsumed by that of an overriding culture. Here it is Mathias, but any sort of cultural elitism might do. To parallel Annabelle’s activism with Etienne’s astaticism as the film does might be trite (and it is), but it nonetheless illustrates Civeyrac’s position adequately – a life via art is not in any degree more true than one without, and to assume that a taste for Bresson equates with a knowledge of the world or of any sort of ‘truth’ is a presumption too far. The bifurcated structure may lead to a distinctly bipolar viewing experience, and there are plenty of less successful narrative lines and thematic ideas not discussed above; but on balance, Civeyrac has achieved an unexpected example of cinematic self-critique.

6/10

A Paris Education (Mes provinciales) had its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 10th. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below: 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews the Coen Brothers’ experimental anthology Western.

The Coen Brothers have always been filmmakers capable of great range. While their most recognisable works typically bend towards a kind of comedy, they have also successfully dabbled in the world of serious drama: a biopic in New York’s music scene; a Cold War thriller; a classic western remake. Their latest project initially seemed to be a stretch even further – a series of short films set around the wild west, each to be released as a separate episode. This ambition later retreated to the still-curious idea of an anthology film, encompassing six shorts in a single runtime. While tonally similar, these short stories would range in subject and genre in a similar setting; a playground for writer-directors so creative as the Coens. The result, however, is bland, guileless, and suggests far too much stretched from far too little.

The first entry is the Coens at their most Looney Tunes since Raising Arizona. We open to a singing cowboy on horseback, dressed in all-white and addressing the camera directly. We learn he is the eponymous Buster Scruggs, an infamous outlaw with a taste for finery. He encounters various rival bandits on the road and guns them each down in an increasingly (and surprisingly) violent fashion, and afterwards breaks spontaneously into song. There is some value to this section – the singing in particular is an inspired choice – but it also betrays issues that will become far more apparent as the film goes on. A pointlessness to proceedings prevails; besides the most basic of moral takeaways it appears to be a skit for its own sake. There is nothing inherently wrong with that, of course, until it stops being funny.

By the second entry this creeping worry becomes more fully formed. James Franco appears as a bank robber, but is stopped by a man using pans as body armour (funny). During the lynching he is then afforded, the local law are attacked by Indians, leaving him strung up with only his less-than-still horse between him and asphyxiation (funny). Then he is rescued by a herder who turns out to be a thief, ending up at the gallows again (also funny). But besides these three events, and one or two jokes thrown in between, it’s hard not to wonder where the Coens were going with this one. What could the point be, other than the haplessly simplistic “what goes around comes around”? It isn’t tight enough to justify its purely comedic existence, and has nothing to say or show otherwise. These are at best five-minute skits, but here they are stretched to twenty.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the third part, in which Liam Neeson runs a sort of freak show with one exhibit, a limbless man. The twist? Rather than show him off as grotesque and horrible, the act involves him reading extensively from classical texts, finishing on the Declaration of Independence. It’s almost funny, and maybe would have been as a short bit in The Mitchell and Webb Show. But though the punchline has been spent, the Coens march on. We follow this man and his boy across various shows as their audiences decline, his act growing stale. It goes on and on. Neeson visits a prostitute at one point, contributing nothing but a laughless joke; still it goes on. The material here is barely amusing in concept, but made all the worse by its simple lack of longevity. There is only so much that can be done with a limbless man who knows the Bible by memory; ironically, this very limitation is what the short is actually about.

The fourth part might be the only one I can say I fully enjoyed, though even then in a relative sense. It features Tom Waits as a wild-wandering prospector, and his various experiences in searching for a vein of gold. The narrative arc (it has an arc) seems intentionally trite, with Waits’ corruption of the verdant land punished both instantly and inexplicably. The combination Waits’ screen presence and the pleasant visuals make it an easy watch, and the sense that it is actually going somewhere at all is welcome and gratifying. Had it been released as a standalone short I might be more critical, but here it becomes a sort of oasis; a short that is both well-paced and containing some internal narrative interest.

In the fifth, this idea of pace is entirely discarded. It is long and meandering, a sort of Oregon Trail romance that has no real spark or narrative drive. We follow along only because we must, as a young woman who has recently lost her brother forms a sort of professional relationship with the sheriff, which eventually (and blandly) transforms into something more (or so we are told). While the vistas are beautiful (the cinematography largely is throughout), they are little compensation for a story so lacking in substance otherwise. The scope is naturally limited by nature of form, yet any hope this might be used as some kind of excuse is dashed by the ten minutes spent on a sudden attack of Indians, one that separates the two characters that have actually been defined in any significant sense. A decent action scene, but again a misuse of time and space in an already overextended episode in an overextended anthology.

The final part is perhaps a little better than this, focused entirely on a single conversation between the various inhabitants of a carriage (something the Coens have always been capable of writing), but even this, like the rest, can’t quite escape feeling just a little futile. It begs the question of what the original idea might have amounted to – would the additional time offered by standalone episodes permit further depth and development to these ideas, or would they have been stretched even thinner to compensate? Whatever the answer is, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs remains a significant misfire for the Coens – a spent six-shooter that missed every shot.

3/10

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs will be released on Netflix on November 16th. Check out the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Shinya Tsukamoto’s Edo-period samurai feature. 

In Japan, the B-movie still thrives. Cheaply (and quickly) produced films have long had a market there in a lively direct-to-DVD scene (which does not necessarily suggest low quality as in the West), and many directors of these films also work theatrically, resulting in a wide range of cinematic output. Takashi Miike is the most recognisable figure of this grouping, an incredibly prolific director whose work ranges from the low-budget exploitation Dead & Alive trilogy to a Hollywood-friendly remake of 13 Assassins. But most pertinent to Shinya Tsukamoto’s latest is his 2017 feature Blade of the Immortal, a Jidaigeki manga adaptation with an emphasis on killing, the unkillable, and gore. Killing, as the name might suggest, engages with each of these themes in its own, contrary, manner.

Most directly, the title refers to Sosuke Ikematsu’s samurai, who finds himself unable to kill, despite his great ability in the art of swordplay. This might seem a basic narrative contrivance for the film, but it has a surprising thematic depth. Killing is set deep in Japan’s Edo period, the century and a half following the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600. During this period, the Tokugawa Shogunate established a firm grip over Japan, leading to an unprecedented period of peace. For a country dominated by a military class, this left great questions over their utility and purpose. For some, such as the famous Miyamoto Musashi, this peace permitted time to master the art of swordplay in a more philosophical sense, and also permitted a development of ideas pertaining to honourable conduct amongst the warrior class. Musashi reportedly fought in six battles, but many of his admirers would have fought in none. The act of killing had become detached from the role of the warrior, and in Killing Tsukamoto evidences the impotence of a warrior class who is so unused to war.

Impotence is the word for it, too. Tsukamoto parallels Ikematsu’s inability to kill with his sexual failings. He appears to be a chronic masturbator, able to simulate sex much as he can simulate combat, but incapable of the deed itself, despite a present (and seemingly willing) participant. The film’s form does not shy away from presenting this parallel bluntly: shots of Ikematsu gripping his sword phallically abound; he has a lust for death but is incapable of performing. Rarely have sex and death been paired so obscenely, though often bedfellows.

This idea is built around a narrative that constantly teases something Tsukamoto knows he will not provide. The initial setup suggests a sort of Seven Samurai type scenario, in which one samurai seeks to build a team of experts who are then trapped in a village besieged by thugs. Ikematsu confronts these neer-do-wells, but is so frightened of the idea of killing that he all but befriends them, awkwardly laughing at their jokes, promising the villagers that they aren’t so bad. When his new master suggests he set off on the road to Edo, he suddenly falls ill – a psychosomatic case no doubt. This is an intensely revisionist vision of the ronin, one emasculated in every sense.

Said revisionism feeds through into the film’s form. Its rough handheld becomes an almost indecipherable mess of cuts during fight scenes (that isn’t an entirely good thing), and otherwise makes use of ample crossfades and jerky movement. Some of this style is dictated by necessity – the day-for-night scenes do not appear to be artistically motivated – but the overwhelming aesthetic is one similar to Miike’s low-budget formal mania: equal parts questionable and absorbing, particularly a Sanjuro style blood-explosion from near the film’s end. This is met with an excellent ambient soundtrack from Chu Ishikawa (which will sadly be his last), one that grounds the often-ridiculous content with a sense of reflective seriousness. I wouldn’t say this is a particularly reflective film overall – it has far too much fun for that – but it is undeniable that there is a tonal element of that kind lurking underneath. Also undeniable is that Killing makes for a very entertaining eighty minutes, a creaky but curious film that shows far more than it says.

6/10

Killing (斬、) had its premiere at Venice Film Festival. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews David Oelhoffen’s newest crime thriller.

Well if it was any other man, I’d put him straight away
But when it’s your brother sometimes you look the other way

In a genre of heartbreakers, there are few country songs that seep tragedy like Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Highway Patrolman’. Two brothers who have fallen on opposite sides of the law, compelled by their natures to clash and clash, until they can clash no more. It isn’t just the friend-made-foe convention that makes it such an effectual story, but rather the moral quandaries it implies. The lines that must be crossed in the name of fraternity, the unsure grey between individual honour and wider ethical belief. It was Dante who decided that treachery served as the road to hell’s deepest circle, but the question remains: treachery to whom? The law, or kin? It is around that question Close Enemies finds its drama.

Oelhoffen’s crime thriller might not concern brothers, but it comes close enough by centering on old friends, at one point fellow criminals, one now reformed. They are linked not just by their past but their material condition – both are born of immigrant families, and both find themselves alienated for this fact. Manuel (Matthias Schoenaerts) laughs at a joke about Arabs begging on the street – the French are very giving if you are asking for money to go back home. Driss (Reda Kateb)  mentions in passing that only while working in narcotics can his face be an advantage rather than the opposite. That these themes are held at some distance is to the film’s benefit, and an example of Oelhoffen’s smart restraint – this is not a film about race in France so much as one that includes such issues in a wider context. It does not need to grandstand the facts; that they make up an organic part of the film’s environment is enough.

Another sharp decision is in the presentation of Manuel and Driss’ relationship to begin with. It is not exposited in lengthy dialogue, nor shown in flashback or prologue, nor discussed in serious detail. It only becomes evident after the film has already established its momentum, and even then only across a few lines and moments. A scene in which Driss glances over old photographs of the pair might cross this line, but I feel this is simply to ensure that everyone is on the same page. It is the sort of dynamic that can easily find itself overwrought – not so here. This extends to their shared scenes, in which the potential melodrama of suddenly invoking their old friendship is always avoided. Their bond is implicit, and feels all the more real for this fact; it does not need to be shouted or repeated.

But besides this relationship, the film is otherwise very much plot-driven. It moves at a consistent pace, never short on new revelations or developments to further it ahead. It is largely conventional in its series of betrayals and twists, but then this is a film that thrives in convention. A well-made genre picture should not be discarded for that fact – especially one so ably crafted as this. The camera is loose and active, handheld but always clear enough for the action. This is matched with the editing, which prefers extended shots to cutting in the manner of a similar Hollywood project. This permits an intimate tension at times, the diegesis trapped with its protagonist as he is stalked through the projects. Threats often appear offscreen, some never clarified; gunshots from afar are a recurring motif of this kind. Again, not an original innovation, but an effective example of a well-worn mould.

That would be an apt description for the film taken together, particularly as it reaches its pathos-soaked conclusion. All the beats are hit, but with consummate ability. It doesn’t ever threaten to be anything more than a simple police procedural, and really it doesn’t need to be. This is effective entertainment that justifies its context and content enough to carry a genuine weight and impact. Expect an American remake somewhere down the line.

6/10

Close Enemies (Frères ennemis) had its premiere at Venice Film Festival. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s upcoming drama. 

“Von Donnersmarck: two features, never more.”

For a while this was one of the great tragedies of modern German cinema, the acclaimed director of The Lives of Others dropping off the cinematic map after completion of his poorly-received (though relatively successful) sophomore effort. Eight years later he returns with a grand and sweeping narrative about art, love, and Nazis. With an estimated $20 million budget, it is also amongst Germany’s most expensive productions, and that much is clear.

In approaching this three-hour behemoth, however, I detect an uneven split. There is the more substantial film, one that concerns the process of artistic creation, its meanings and origins, set around an artist living in East and West Germany during the Cold War. Then is another, a melodrama about love and eugenics in the GDR, an exaggerated and far less engaging subplot that consumes most of the film’s first half. It is in this melodrama that many of the film’s issues come to the fore, the first and most essential being its appearance. While the cinematography is technically well executed, it is the production design that must be questioned. Everything has a sheen, a brightness and cleanliness. It almost reflects the romantic cinema of the thirties and forties, obsessed with beautifying everything and everyone. Kurt (Tom Schilling) might paint all day and night in one scene, but God forbid his perfect hair might fall out of place, or his fresh face be besmirched by some blemish. And Ellie (Paula Beer) may age more than a decade by the film’s close, but let that not show on her faultless body, always caught in a warm and welcoming light. For a film so caught up with the concept of truth, it seems perhaps ironic that it presents a visual aesthetic so unreal.

This unreality follows into this subplot’s villain, too. Professor Seeband (Sebastian Koch), an ex-Nazi eugenicist, becomes the arch-evil, the father-in-law from hell. Not only is he a Nazi (the skull on his cap emphasised like in that Mitchell and Webb skit), but he’s a philanderer, prickly in attitude, and a general bastard all round. His character cannot be compelling because he is entirely contrived, and nothing about him is at all refined or rounded. It is possible for a Nazi to be human even if they are still despicable –  this kind of moral depth might have given the film something to grasp on in this extended section. Instead we are left with a ruefully predictable romance, one whose dramatic ironies veer increasingly in the direction of soap opera. It is competently, if not excellently made and always watchable. But at once, disappointing.

While the sections focused on art must still endure the rather ironic aesthetic qualities of the film, they are a little more developed in narrative, and for the better. The central idea is an artist finding his voice, caught between extremes. The first of these is in the Soviet clench of East Germany, where limitations are obvious. He is trapped in the genre of social realism, which prioritizes immediate and obvious meaning to the more indulgent habits of artists. This is art for the people, a populism of sorts, one that sees bourgeois in the abstract. Von Donnersmarck is clear to reflect this belief against Nazi rejection of degenerate art, for much the same reasoning.

Kurt then emigrates to West Germany, but here faces a foe less obvious than Soviet artistic tastes, that being a lack of substance altogether. Instead, it is necessary to produce something garish and loud, new and outspoken. A total freeform in which it is easy to lose oneself, as Kurt almost does. He must discover his own style, and what it means to have a style at all. This arc functions, but it functions as any might predict. Again, for all its artistic pretentions in content, the film’s form is deeply conventional, and perhaps loses a sense of its subject in being so. At Eternity’s Gate, while perhaps not so pristinely crafted as Never Look Away, achieves its own goal of explicating the artistic process far better in its attempt to embody it. We see as Van Gogh sees, and understand the world as he does fully. While von Donnersmarck occasionally experiments with point of view shots, this is largely a film from the objective eye. Everything is as it seems.

I am left at a crossroads with Never Look Away. It is generally engaging and always well crafted, but at once lacking in direct, evocative feeling. It hits every beat, but as the (surprisingly smooth) run-length trundles on, emotional investment always seems out of reach. The acting is generally up to standard, at least half of the music is great (with the other half being uncharacteristically bland for Max Richter), and it’s difficult to fault von Donnersmarck’s understanding of space or camera placement. But the result is spectacle that fails to move.

5/10

Never Look Away (Werk ohne Autor) had its premiere at Venice Film Festival. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its German trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Kazakh director Emir Baigazin’s latest feature. 

The River (Ozen) is a film split into three. It starts as a soothing and meditative piece on family in isolation, continues into a trite analysis of technology and its discontents, before concluding with a striking consideration of hierarchy and power. As might be expected, these three sections are linked by the eponymous river, a device that takes on new metaphorical meanings as the film drifts by. It is in many ways a flawed work, inconsistent and naïve, and yet is at once engrossing, even enchanting.

The first of the film’s segments introduces its characters, primarily the five brothers who will drive its plot. They are led by the eldest, Aslan, a solemn boy who seems alienated by this position of supposed authority. Their father appears in frame only occasionally, generally as a disciplinary figure. They grow restless, and the eldest becomes unsure of himself. But they are in the middle of a wide emptiness – modern civilisation would appear absent entirely if not for their father’s motorbike. As such they survive in their own way. Emir Baigazin’s camera focuses on the boys at play, the boys at work. As they wander the wilderness, astounding compositions portrays the Kazakh wastes as rarely seen, yellow rocks against the cutting blue sky. These shots are slow, and generally do not imply direction, but resist being ponderous. Instead they are immersive, fragile snapshots of a world so far removed. The introduction of the river changes this feeling a little, suggesting a tension. Against the stillness of frame its fast current becomes electric. Dangerous. The boys are taken in by its lure, but resist its rushing course. It seems as though the river represents a certainty in life, a constant and unchanging motion. But also a pleasure, the likes of which the boys hadn’t yet experienced.

Then begins the second, with the arrival of Kanat, a boy from the city. The tone immediately changes. This young cousin zips around on a segway and dressed in a reflective silver hoodie. He holds in his hands a tablet that plays obnoxiously loud 8-bit music, presumably from what is supposed to be a video game. Kanat is a caricature, and apparently a caricature from a different decade. He is the modern world, the opposition to the hills and crags and lonely peaks that have so far been established. He is also a vastly uninteresting addition to the film. We watch as his tablet slowly corrupts all but the eldest of the brothers. They begin to fight over the game, as if they hadn’t before. They begin to masturbate, as if they hadn’t before. They begin to become greedy and commodified, something they had also, apparently, been protected from. I’m not suggesting that technology has no real impact on the world, so much as that the impact displayed here is of a totally naïve kind. Tech rarely creates these behaviours, but it might exacerbate them – there is no sense of Baigazin acknowledging this fact, instead presenting Kanat’s bag of tricks as the serpent of Eden. Not so serious as that, I would add, nor quite so equivocal, but close. Now the river is technology, a treacherous force that enraptures those who come near – it can be treaded so long, before taking you under.

Suddenly Kanat disappears, and Baigazin reveals his final hand. The eldest son takes responsibility for the disappearance but forces a silence on the others by revealing the secrets of each in turn. As a result, each of his brothers begin to treat him as an authority figure, informing on the others, obeying his ever-harsher word. His father says that he has become a man, but it seems rather a channelling of frustration after Kanat had stolen his spotlight. A tension emerges that is never fully resolved, but the sudden change in dynamic works nonetheless, a sort of coming of age, and one that benefits greatly from the edging out of Kanat’s character. By the film’s conclusion a certain fraternity is achieved, and the river changes again. Now it appears a sort of catharsis, a symbol of closeness and brotherhood. It flows together, as one. Peace has returned to the plain.

6/10

The River had its premiere at Venice Film Festival on September 3rd, 2018. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Zhang Yimou’s newest visually-captivating wuxia epic. 

Grey is a dull colour. It connotes the industrial and the ascetic, a lack of character and concrete emptiness. It is rarely striking, instead a kind of paste, a middle-ground between dark and light but never so stark as either. A grey day is miserable and uninteresting. A grey tone suggests a slowness, or an emotionlessness, or a bureaucracy. The modernist cinema of Antonioni or the realist cinema of the British kitchen sink directors often relied on grey to create mood, but the mood was ever bleak, ever dour. Black and white cinema tends to rely on contrast to contradict a greyness; they called it the silver screen to avoid that dusky alternative. But Zhang Yimou, master of the vivid and bright, has crafted a grey film. Every element of the production design sits between charcoal and white smoke; clothing, scenery, weaponry, and décor. A real-world desaturation, mired in constant rainfall. This is far from the vivacious crimson of Raise the Red Lantern and the lush greens and blues of Hero, and yet equally arresting. Zhang’s artistry is incredible in its detail, every element in step with the next – before the film has even begun he has exhibited one of his crucial cinematic talents: the ability to create a world most unlike our own, grant it an internal consistency, and inhabit it with some myth or legend of his own devising.

This colouring, or decolouring as it might be considered, threads into this legend. Zhang imagines a world where the shadow and light of Ying and Yang have merged, where motivations and intentions become unclear, loyalty and betrayal overlap, where masks fall, then fall again. It opens in the royal court of Pei, a kingdom that has been humiliated and supplicated by the neighbouring Yang. The city of Jing had been lost, but the king now seems weary and unwilling to take it back. He prefers a delicate peace, ensured by an uneven alliance with their once-enemy. In this fractious court is Commander Yu, a jingoistic war hero who seeks to face General Yang in single combat and regain Jing in his victory. A straightforward arc, only that this is not the real Commander Yu, but his ‘shadow’. The actual Yu resides hidden behind the court’s walls, sick and dying; he has sent a double to take his place, his wife supporting him in this scheme.

Already, a duplicity begins to emerge, a maze of motivations intertangling beneath a more typical wuxia story. As has become especially prominent in recent cinema – and especially at Venice, between The Other Side of the Wind, Vox Lux, American Dharma, and Sunset – Shadow (影) exists in a marsh of fiction, but a fiction that eventually consumes truth, twists it into a new thing. Yu’s double slowly begins to inhabit the original’s role and position, replicating his actions and his emotions. Yu’s wife becomes unsure of herself, lost between the real Yu and a double that more accurately represents the man she once loved. The film ends at the confluence of these anxieties, and while it becomes a little convoluted it also permits a degree of curiosity that the rest of the film – entertaining though it is – generally resists.

This entertainment is again wrought from Zhang’s absolute command of craft. He imbues his fight scenes with an element of grace that only the very best of wuxia cinema can achieve: his use of slow motion is essential, punctuating the rhythm of a battle and permitting a lingering eye on the physical beauty there displayed. The choreography is more like dance than what passes for combat in most western cinema, intricately and beautifully performed; bodies pushed to their physical limit, witnessed in the soak of a rainstorm. This is then accentuated in typical style, through wirework and CGI, though Zhang restrains himself a little in these areas, particularly against his more recent filmography. Wires are used to emphasise jumps but not to create the mythic duels of Hero, preferring a (relatively) more grounded approach. CGI, too, is held back by set pieces that are a little more restrained. The hail of arrows or gust of leaves that look so plastic in Hero are absent here. The exception is a landslide-type set piece of such brilliant audacity that it is difficult to critique in any technical sense – even describing it would be an indecipherable folly.

These battle scenes are also imbued with more precise filmic detail. The editing builds tension through effective crosscutting, one moment coupling a musical performance to two simultaneous duels, a kinetic camera exploring each of these scenarios with vigour in turn. The music itself is also excellent, using the jolting chords of a guzheng and guqin to pace both the quieter political scenes and the raucous battle. The wider soundtrack has a similar impact, with spluttering arterial spurts and generic weapon swooshes providing an aural impact to the choreography in motion, which is further enlivened by the ceaseless pelting of rain. The sum of all this is not something that resembles reality, but it is in this unreality that wuxia and Zhang best operate. This is given a new dimension by the film’s own thematic direction, in which everything seems to be an imitation or contradiction of something else.

It is a little unfortunate that much like Hero, Shadow must also falter under its narrative. These characters might be legendary tropes, but they, and many of their stories, still feel contrived. Events must take place for the story to develop, rather than events that take place because of the developing story. There are also a few too many ‘gotcha’ moments, the kind of expositionary explanations offered by a victorious schemer after he has successfully fooled his mark. Instead of declaring and explaining exactly what they know, how they knew it, and why they acted on that information in the way that they did, characters could instead simply act in a way that makes all those facts implicit. For the obvious spy in the court to be outed as an obvious spy does not then need a narration on the exact uses of a spy who is obvious, to cite one example.

But for its deficiencies in writing, Zhang still presents and exceptional visual experience. His world is built with such consummate talent, his fight scenes choreographed with a rare eye, his set pieces so outrageous they become surreal. Certainly not Zhang’s best or most graceful film, but another solid entry to his enviable canon.

7/10

Shadow will have its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Carlos Reygadas’ newest drama. 

Our Time (Nuestro Tiempo) is a film that constantly teases beauty.

It features a strong thematic progression, in which a man must come to terms with the inescapable decline of his relationship. He must watch as his wife grows restless, as she stares into the eyes of another with a look once reserved only for him. He must juggle with the sense and nonsense of it all, through self-doubt and revaluation. He becomes cuckold not for weakness but desperation, some vain attempt to capture again what he has lost, to witness that which he covets so dearly. But he can only peek through the cracks; she is gone, even if it takes a long time for her to fully disappear. He is left dissolute, but nothing can be done. Their time, as it were, is done.

The cinematography is also of note. The gorgeous landscapes, the closeness of children at play, the vast open plains. The camera will often leave its subjects or allow those subjects to leave it, capturing an empty frame, an incomplete image. As structure and stability leave the central marriage, even the diegesis cannot keep it contained; again, the end is inevitable, no matter the platitudes repeated to one another. In other moments the camera will remain, but light will not. The vaguest of outlines might be decipherable, but nothing more. Again, a sense of something that is no longer there, not in any substantial way.

With this cinematography comes Reygadas’ eye for imagery. He shoots a rumbling desire through the vivaciousness of a timpani concerto, booming drums and roaring brass. Post-coital lust is visually felt through the parts of a car, its engine and axel, a wheel running through the mud. This mud will obscure the screen, and then reveal a memory, or dream. Memory itself is presented vicariously through Juan’s son, who is currently embarking on his own young, and illicit, love. His passion opens the film, unformed and precious as it is, and lingers in the mind as a constant reminder of what things once were. The other side of the film is bookended by a similar image of love and devotion – a man filled with tumours, sure of his death, but surrounded by those he adores and who adore him. Juan envies this dying man his surety of fate and the care afforded him. It is an idiotic jealousy, but one he feels truly, one that evidences how little he has left.

And yet I cannot say that I liked the film, despite a formal and contextual grounding as impressive as this. These elements fall through the gaping cracks of poor construction and loose structure, lost to a circular and monotonous pace. Nearing three hours, Our Time does not spread itself wisely. For more than the first third it stands as nothing more than de rigueur affair cinema, lacking any intrigue beyond a cheating wife and her suspicious texting. At this point the characters only have a very foundational development; the result is a sense of drifting through to nothing. I was sure this feeling would not last the whole film, but that I could feel it at all cannot be ignored.

The final two thirds introduce the main narrative, but suffer similarly with extended periods of uneventful drifting. It seems as though Reygadas intended to create a sense of the gradual or the glacial, a painfully slow coming apart, delayed at any opportunity. But his point survives without necessitating long and repetitive stretches of the same thing. Neither Juan or his wife are interesting enough characters to spend so long with, since only the former’s realisations offer the film any momentum at all. It becomes a back and forth that serves only to undermine the emotional impact a shorter film might have courted; a sad fate for such artistry as this.

By its conclusion, Our Time again brushes with the transcendent, with some incredible footage of bulls fighting and cavorting. An ambivalent fog strolls across the fields as these great beasts break and crash against one another, their hulking forms a manifestation of the tension the film so often – too often – withholds. One amongst them is tossed down a hill, defeated by his rivals. He is left alone, battered, dying. Juan, I would imagine. Not a subtle image, but evocative. It is a shame that little of the film before, so fertile in basis, can provoke to a similar degree.

5/10

Our Time had its world premiere at Venice Film Festival on September 5th, 2018. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below: 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews S. Craig Zahler’s latest crime action thriller.

It’s almost a shame that films of this kind are now forced to endure the weight of cinematic sheen for a chance of exposure. Exploitation pictures of old could almost rely on ropey technicals for a sense of character, but the environment that could produce and support such films has slowly diminished, even if an audience still exists for a similar kind of picture. Enter Dragged Across Concrete, a genre epic splashing together buddy comedy, crime thriller, and old-school gore. S. Craig Zahler has been a sort of one-man revival for this kind of cinema, and his debut, Bone Tomahawk, combined the weary western with a hint of horror gore and the ever-dependable Kurt Russell. It’s almost the kind of cinema that might’ve been dreamed of in the 80s: a world in which Mel Gibson will be gunning down bad guys for the rest of time. And closing in on three hours, that’s around how long this film feels.

But while I’m certainly game for the hypermasculine ultraviolence contained in the average Gibson fixture, I have struggled with Zahler in the past. His debut felt inherently overwrought, its own sense of importance blunting its sharp edge to a clumsy bludgeon. A moment of gore in Bone Tomahawk became almost instantly infamous, but for me it was just that. A moment. Perhaps in fear of devaluing the event Zahler reeled everything in up to that point, but very little filled its place, beyond clunky exposition and circular character development.

Dragged Across Conflict is similar, but much worse in this regard. Attempting to tackle at least three simultaneous storylines, its own genre bending results in an inconsistent tone and pace. At one moment it is a police procedural, a slow-burn stakeout punctuated by humour and narrative mystique. Then it sets up a ten-minute joke, the result being a sudden gore-show, before returning to its original mode with the audacity to suggest some kind of remorse. It isn’t so much not knowing how to feel, but knowing all too well how the film wants you to feel, and skipping through these moods at will. This isn’t a combination of genres so much as a slideshow of them, the conclusion being a loss of both the carefree violence of an exploitation picture and the emotional payoff of a more serious police film. We are left in a strange, grey, middle ground, in which nothing matters but everything does.

This is made yet more complicated when Zahler throws some thematic ideas in the pot. He briefly seems to examine the spread of racism among working class families, but then leaves this thread loose, a decision made all the more questionable by the content that follows. Vince Vaughn’s character is almost insultingly spared any investigation at all on this point by being given a black girlfriend, as though that is sufficient. There is certainly a degree of self-awareness at work here – Gibson’s speech about police efficiency is of a similar tune to Orson Welles’ in Touch of Evil – but the more satirical grounds of Zahler’s film are left equally unexplored. He signals to us that he doesn’t approve of police brutality and racism despite their appearance in the film, and little more than that.

Less sensical than this is the simultaneous storyline that follows an ex-con getting back in the game. He has a disabled brother and a drug-using prostitute mother (another tonal mismatch) and so, presumably, needs the money to get by. That’s about all the justification his narrative line receives, and by its conclusion the exact takeaway seems to be muddled at best. It’s something along the lines of ‘crime does pay’ without any clear comment beyond that point. As a ‘survival of the fittest’ sort of twist it might function, but then a bizarre epilogue is tagged on the end to suggest some kind of emotional gratification. Maybe it’s supposed to be funny, but then against many of the genuinely good jokes in much of the film, it fails to tickle.

It is this comedy that saves the film from the constant threat of monotony. Gibson and Vaughn make an entertaining pairing, and their scenes together exhibit the better side of Zahler’s writing ability, including an actual catchphrase for Vaughn (that never quite catches, but hey, it’s there). Had this film been condensed into a more reasonable length and been focused on this dynamic I imagine it could have worked, even worked quite well. It is the desire for the grandiose, the attempt at something sprawling and intermingling, that undoes any quality hinted at. We are left instead with a hollow epic, one that overshadows nothing but itself.

4/10

Dragged Across Concrete had its world premiere at Venice Film Festival on September 3rd, 2018. Its trailer has yet to be released. 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner takes a look at Julian Schnabel’s ode to Van Gogh. 

It has a name like an Emily Dickinson poem, and At Eternity’s Gate covers much the same territory. Following Van Gogh at the end of his life, it muses on the beauty of nature, on loneliness and alienation, and on the great beyond. It is fashioned much like the work of Terrence Malick, featuring a flowing camera drifting about forests and fields, characters circling each other as they speak in vagaries, and the occasional voiceover linking together an elliptical cut, set to leap ahead at any moment or fade to a sudden black. It is most unlike last year’s Loving Vincent, a film that covered a similar ground (albeit from the reverse angle). That film, while astounding in its making, is flat and simple in script – a work of fine artistry, but mediocre art. At Eternity’s Gate might be the opposite, always artistic, but perhaps a little looser at the seams.

It flourishes best when set in the nature Van Gogh so loved. The colours saturate, the film stock grows grainy, the camera peers up and through the trees. In these moments we are not told that Van Gogh loves nature: we feel it. Set to French impressionism or minimalist piano, we follow him into the wilds. The camera rushes through the yellows and greens, enjoying every moment. Shots from Van Gogh’s point of view are altered further, with the lower half of the screen defocused. This represents his manner of seeing the world, a certain distortion, a blurriness that might be detected in his landscapes. By no means an effect meant to replicate his work, it is instead a suggestion of subjectivity, a leaning toward the supposition that we all glimpse the same nature in different ways. These moments of happiness seem almost unusual, with the image of Van Gogh so often associated with the mood of his drearier works (the titular oil painting especially). Cinematically, said mood also prevails: Loving Vincent viewed the man in a sombre retrospect, and Maurice Pialat’s 1991 biopic also saw little room for levity. This may not be a happy film, but it is not one bereft of happiness. It does not lose yellow for blue.

Slightly less accomplished are the scenes structured around dialogue. These differ formally in their more restrained nature, and will often be conceptually focused, with Van Gogh explicating some belief or other and being fenced against by an interlocutor of some kind. Most often this will be Gaugin, who initially rejects Van Gogh’s obsession with painting the real and the seen. He prefers painting from the mind, abstract, indoors. Van Gogh’s argument is that painting the scenery is just as internal, as it is less the trees of France that he paints than the trees of his mind’s eye, different from any other. These conversations are often interesting, but do occasionally risk straying into the academic. It seems almost ironic that Schnabel frames these lengthy discussions about feeling over thinking when he has already evidenced his ability to do so through visual prowess alone – a sense of redundancy drips into shot. This is made worse by the occasional habit of repeating dialogue – though that is in part a representation of Van Gogh’s suffering mind – as a line that, said once, might sound true or wise risks pretentiousness when echoed; and pretentiousness is a fate this film narrowly skirts at some points.

But then the film will grasp back with something more physical, something direct. Van Gogh’s struggles with reality are portrayed viscerally through the camera, often tilting and panning as if to somehow understand better its subject. Dafoe’s performance is expectedly impressive, managing to capture both the spark of genius and the blaze of discomfort at once; he seems always to be teetering, bar when among the trees. His cognisant discussion with a priest best fulfils this feeling, with his insights on life and art falling disturbingly close to his personal comparisons with Jesus; in this conversation he seems both to drift in and out of lucidity, aware of his madness in a way madmen are not supposed to be.

If beset occasionally by structural shakiness, At Eternity’s Gate is not a film obsessed with plotting or pacing. It prefers to drift, to glance at branches and listen to the impossible music on the wind. It understands Van Gogh and his paintings – better are they experienced in three dimensions than Loving Vincent’s two – and displays his person through snapshots of his final days. Small insights and revelations often avoid formative moments altogether or approach them indirectly. It is a film of visual beauty, a grasp to understand a great artist on his own terms, rather than breaking down his character and analysing the pieces. It is here that it differs most from Loving Vincent, a film that sought to present Van Gogh as a mystery to be solved, puzzle pieces that belong together. There we look at him, here we look as him.

8/10

At Eternity’s Gate had its world premiere at Venice Film Festival on September 3rd, 2018. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Brady Corbet’s extravagant exploration of stardom. 

Vox Lux is a grandiose film. Its relatively prosaic story is elevated to ludicrous heights by orchestral flourishes, associative montage, and three acts on title cards. Even the title is soaked in prestige, the Latin for ‘voice’ and ‘light’. The protagonist (Natalie Portman) is named Celeste – heavenly. Accusations of artifice might seem appropriate, and they are. Corbet thrives in it, and more, has made a film about artifice. The pop music centre of Vox Lux is not incidental, but rather its direct subject. A Star Is Born took on a similar subject, and the result was tasteless – an empty shell, comment replaced by sentiment. Corbet, however, unpacks fame and those caught in its beam, insight hid between each provocative flash.

The film opens in 1999, in a manner that might be unexpected for a rise-and-fall music film – a school shooting. The scene initially serves as a kind of origin story for its Miley Cyrus type protagonist, but becomes far more incisive as the film goes on. The shooter introduces himself as he enters the classroom, and then does so again. His act requires exposure – he must be known. Without the fame, infame, whatever it might be known as, everything he has done becomes nothing. And it is a circular pattern – the media stokes interest in heinous acts to generate attention and profit, leading others to follow the same path. It is little different to pop stardom, Corbet supposes, a feedback loop of attention for which genuine substance becomes an afterthought.

This is taken further in a new event that instigates the second act: a terrorist attack using iconography taken from a Celeste music video. It is supposed that this is an act of sheer provocation, using the image of an immodest woman to represent all that the perpetrators hate about the West. But Celeste realises it is less the exact meaning of the masks than that they provoke a reaction. The modern world prizes that reaction above all, and for terrorists, just like school shooters or pop stars, that is their power. The power of headlines, the power of being listened to, even if they have nothing of interest to say. What the terrorists wanted or stood for is left oblique, much for this reason. This is pop music meets post-truth; it doesn’t matter what is said, or even how it is said, only that people know who said it, and loudly.

Corbet builds these themes organically within a slightly more conventional narrative arc, though presented with fiery élan. Celeste’s fall from innocent child to drugged-out has-been functions in that it rejects the sort of naivety that plagues the likes of A Star Is Born. As much as Celeste initially presents herself to be incorrupt, she has from the very start a leaning toward the illicit. Fame exaggerates and enables this tendency, but does not create it. The sheer nonsense of the star system is then grounded by the droll narration of Willem Dafoe, who presents what is a very real scenario as some kind of twisted fairy tale, completed with a literal deal with the devil. But that is what makes the film so very obscene – it is entirely believable, a grand version of a very familiar reality. It is this conscious self-importance that leads to the film’s third act, which captures a Celeste concert in all its vainglory. Her washed-out and tired appearance is replaced by glitter and performance, dance and music. Image is everything, and here we are given a glimpse. Whatever truth that lay before is forgone in an instant, flashing artifice in its place. This is the reality people want to see.

Corbet knows this well, and so injects his own film with a similar flair. Most of the credits are placed at the front of the film, in an extended retro twist. The title has its own Von Trier style card that lingers onscreen. The score is exuberant, winding, sinister. The abstract imagery is striking, sometimes even suggesting Matthew Crawley. The closing credits are stylishly presented after a finale of rare suddenness in contemporary cinema. Many of these elements have no substantive purpose in their own right, but taken with the aesthetic philosophy of the film at large they seem to be an extension of its argument. A bright, even lurid, provocation. Bold choices that will force the film to be noticed, and force a few walkouts too. In short, attention for attention’s sake.

8/10

Vox Lux had its world premiere at Venice Film Festival on September 4th, 2018. It has yet to acquire a UK release date. Check out a teaser below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner appreciates ‘Son of Saul’ director László Nemes’ latest drama.

Like a river running ceaselessly, Sunset (Napszállta) is insatiable. It flows and rushes and crashes with grace and ferocity, rushing into the black, seeking its conclusion with dextrous élan. Son of Saul was a deeply impressive debut from László Nemes, exhibiting a fully formed style and exquisite method – he realises that the best way to emphasise the unshowable is to do just that, keep it from vision. His camera was locked to Saul’s back, a wide frame just revealing hints of the horrors beyond, leaving their detail to the mind of the viewer. Sunset proceeds in a similar vein, but one yet more sophisticated, finding for this form a narrative that fully complements it – one that makes emphatic the unseen, the unknown, the unthinkable.

The film opens in Budapest, sometime in the early 1910s. This is a civilisation on the brink of non-existence, the last gasp for one of Europe’s most illustrious – but least represented – empires. In less than a decade the empire would be strewn asunder in the rubble of the First World War, its wealth and magnitude quickly a forgotten memory; Nemes has created an atmosphere of apocalypse, but one that only seeps from the edges. His Budapest is defined by its extremes – secret societies of both low and high class whisper in the dark corners, poor workmen toil away outside luxury stores, secrets linger on every tongue. He does not present this downfall in a political or even pointedly social manner, preferring instead to evince a tone, a rhythm of decline. It would be difficult to describe what exactly is wrong with Sunset’s Budapest, but it always seems askew, always awry.

The film’s opening shot introduces us to Irisz Leiter, veiled and unknown. She is the orphaned daughter of the man who once owned an exclusive hat shop in central Budapest, one that still bears her family name, and so travels there to take up employment. She is treated with suspicion and without reason sent away, though she refuses to leave the city. News reaches her ear that she might have a brother, but this fact, initially denied, is itself cloaked in yet more ambiguity and ambivalence. This is the mode in which Nemes reveals his narrative, every fact and detail questioned and obscured, a mystery in which everyone seems a complicit agent. The battle lines have been scuffed and hidden, but they lie there still, awaiting definition. Leiter rattles the cage, delving further into an ignored past, enlivening a flame thought cold.

This narrative of obfuscation is compelling, and is matched by a protagonist who drives the plot against any risk of needless obscurity or confusion. Almost every conversation, every decision, every movement or event in the film is at some point interrupted or disturbed. Characters on the verge of revelation will be distracted and pulled away, decisions made will suddenly be reversed, and most consistently will Leiter reject the reality assigned to her. Constantly she will be detained by word or force and in some way resist, constantly she will contradict what might be the expectant direction of the narrative. Instead she is a driving force, forcing a momentum, never supplicant or pathetic. This is a film that never rests, refusing to take any time to reconcile so much as push ever on. In this way, it reflects less a period piece than it does a thriller, unrelenting and exhilarating.

This narrative force is matched and encouraged by Nemes’ formal direction. Maintaining a similar camera to Son of Saul, his lens is often close to Leiter’s back, her body obscuring most of the frame. She is often in motion with the camera maintaining the frame, letting detail slip in from the sides, often out of focus. Her alienation is felt texturally, the mystery is encompassing. This motion also figures into the pace of the film, conversations often taking place with extensive blocking, characters always busy elsewhere, or concerned with some other thing. Leiter’s interruption, and our observance, is very much incidental to the scenario.

This close eye on motion also delves into more specific formal territory, such as Leiter only ever coming into frame from left to right. In western writing this is the direction of progression, of forward movement. It also bears comparison to Agnes Varda’s Vagabond, in which its protagonist is notably caught in traversals that move from right to left. Where Varda’s wanderer, equally isolated in her way, is attempting to escape society, Leiter seeks to probe its hidden depths, implicate herself directly. The deeper she burrows the further her supposed neutrality is questioned, but Nemes always presents her as someone who acts in accordance to herself, not a supposed or genetic allegiance of any kind. Budapest continually reveals itself to be a city built on opposing fronts, but Leiter refuses to directly identify with either, preferring instead to tread the path that encompasses her own conception of justice or truth.

The camera’s closeness to Leiter also results in an immediacy to proceedings, as already essential to the film’s narrative progression. Leiter is centred in every scene, the camera never leaving her for long in the rare cases that it does. This attachment courts tension; any moment of danger becomes doubly unsettling for the knowledge that there is nowhere else the camera can or will cut. We are trapped with Leiter, and must remain at her side as her environments become ever more threatening; even spaces deemed safe take on a sinister tenor. Coupled with Leiter’s tendency to the bold and brash, Sunset almost enters the realm of horror cinema, a descent into unravelling chaos and destruction. The raid of an estate becomes intimate through Leiter’s eyes, and her inherent vulnerability forces what could be a minor event in a more distanced film into being a deeply unsettling set piece.

But most astounding is how Nemes maintains this formal and narrative excellence throughout. Never does the plot slacken, never is attention lost. This is a film of forward motion, progressive momentum, intimacy; and at once also serves as a metaphorical telling of a civilisation crumbling under its own weight. It shines with the glint of Europe’s finest cinema: it has beautifully rich colours, pristine close photography, a cutting string soundtrack. But then, I also feel that one of its closest companions, besides Son of Saul and some nods to the like of Béla Tarr, is Mad Max: Fury Road. A bizarre, even facetious comparison that might initially seem, but they both engage in a similar cinematic mode. They both create scenes of extended and inescapable tension, emphasised by constant motion, constant interruption, constant development in stakes. Fury Road might be more physical than Sunset, but much of their success relies on the same principles, albeit through two very different lenses.

I make that comparison from more than a theoretical position but an emotional one. They both imbued in me a thrill and a levity, a certain disbelief at what I was witnessing. They are not intellectual– though they do find intellectual footfall – but rather experiential, functioning best as a direct cinematic force. This is cinema that cannot be written down, cinema that is explicitly visual and aural. The sculpting of time, which for some films can be incidental, or of middling importance, is here paramount – every moment is justified, every cut reasoned; a story that in some other manner might come across as trite or limited is here elevated to the inimitable. Sunset is the beautiful rush, a confluence of vision and ability so rarely found, and so sweetly savoured.

10/10

Sunset will premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 15th. Take a look at its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Olivier Assayas’ comedy on the Parisian publishing world.

It seems suiting that a film entitled Doubles Vies (English: Non-Fiction) would be one of two parts. It lives its own double life, the first as a supposedly intellectual consideration of publishing in the digital age, the second as the quintessence of French cinema – a middle class social group all engaged in endlessly revolving affairs with one another, each unsure on what exactly constitutes love, and each sure that an extramarital fling certainly does not condemn whatever that thing is. It can even strengthen it, they hope. The double life of the film is, like most moonlighters, an uneven affair. The first part embraces the worst elements of Assayas’ filmography, but there is plenty to be salvaged in the second.

But to begin as the film begins – an extensive monologue on the state of literature in modern-day France. Things aren’t looking good. The supposedly oncoming digitization of books is faltering at the gate. Book sales are up, but from an all-time low – eBooks are falling from an all-time high at serious rates. Does this mean we are a society who does not read? Not exactly. People read, and increasingly write, every day. The internet is the domain of the literate, in some sense, and every blog, text, or tweet represents some form of written expression or communication. Like the witticisms from the ancien régime, one character suggests – and equally valid as literature. All these things are true: literature is an art in decline and the potential consequences for society are wide ranging. But true as they are, Doubles Vies never deigns to delve much further. It frames the above discussion constantly (and often repetitively) as coffee-table debates between middle class peers, but in such a way as to gradually condescend what must be a very particular audience. Every fact is explicated, stats are quoted, ideas are clearly rounded. It is as though Assayas prefers this film as a soapbox to present his various musings and deliver them in much the same way he probably acquired them: as lengthy screeds amongst friends, far more amusing for the participant than the onlooker.

Perhaps if this information was in some way novel it could at least create a sense of didactic interest, but almost every supposed revelation is by now very old news. In Personal Shopper Assayas used technology innovatively whereas Doubles Vies is more like listening to your dad explain the obvious. Assayas at one point creates an analogy to publishing via Bergman, particularly Winter Light. This choice is worth mentioning as in Winter Light Bergman suggests several things about the state of religion in then-modern Sweden without ever having to describe them. A priest preaching to an empty church is a searing image; a gaggle of Frenchmen musing on global trends – often without irony – is less so.

Irony is not something that Assayas lacks, however. It is telling that the various discussions considering the value of the digital over the physical are shot with a very grainy 16mm. The indexical nature of film, now rare against the overwhelming tide of digital, suggests a physicality and warmth – that same descriptor is often applied to vinyl for a similar reason. The remnants of an analogue world, one less efficient but far more tangible, linger. Where digital filmmaking is an interpretation of information – one that can be altered in process – film strips are reacting chemically, directly. This, I would imagine, is Assayas’ meta-argument in favour of the book over the eBook. And to deliver it as a visible fuzz is a great deal more elegant than any amount of spurious intellectualism between friends.

Then there is the framework for this discussion, the network of people that simply cannot keep their hands to themselves. The main dynamic pits Alain, a together and charming publisher, against Léonard, a pathetic slob who apparently has some talent for prose and, shockingly, womanizing. Léonard is more than his serial affairs, however, as he also uses them (exclusively, it would seem) as the subjects of his writing, or “auto-fiction”. He applies the thinnest of veneers, changing a few names here and locations there. A blowjob at The Force Awakens becomes oral at The White Ribbon, a joke that had the Venice crowd in raptures. And fair enough. The tone that permits such silliness is also the reason the film can function so well against its milieu of wordy back and forths. The actual double life is that the film wears the mask of intellectual cinema when it is truly a comedy, and sometimes a very funny comedy at that. The screwball-esque doings of Léonard are gratifying, especially as we witness his supposedly “chaotic” worldview squirrel away when he is presented with that adjective in a more practical capacity. As the film continues this element becomes more prominent (mainly due to a severe reduction in seminars on publishing in the second half), and for the better.

Even the intellectual discussion becomes more interesting when it steers toward the distinction between truth and fiction in writing, and whether an experience might in some way belong to someone, even when veiled. Léonard’s writing does not exist in a void of his creation, but rather the world on which it is based, meaning the fiction-non-fiction he writes has real-world impact despite its supposed fabrication. His insistence that it is fiction, if only in part, does not sever this link to reality as he might like. This is far more interesting territory, or rather territory discussed in a far more interesting way, involving fewer stats and figures than radio discussions and writer Q&As. Here is a slightly more organic explication of ideas.

Ultimately Doubles Vies is a minor work, though it seems this was always the intention. It may falter in its opening half, but then has enough charm and humour to remain afloat and sailing. The performances are all excellent, particularly the ever-dependable Binoche and the listless Macaigne, who have a rare chemistry, or anti-chemistry as it might be described. The camera calls attention to its form and nature even if individual shots are less captivating. The script is just about droll enough to counteract the more grating of its tendencies. These elements might not meld into a great film of any kind, but a good one? That they manage.

6/10

Doubles Vies (Non-Fiction) will have its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 13th. Here’s a clip from the film:

 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner takes a look at the debut of Orson Welles’ long awaited final film. 

A cynic might suggest The Other Side of the Wind cannot be considered a true Orson Welles picture. After all, the man isn’t around to denigrate it, and hasn’t been for a long time. Isn’t this just a cobbling together by friends and colleagues? The long-dead resurrected, but not quite the same? But then, what Welles film is ‘true’, besides Citizen Kane? His filmography is a sort of grand tragedy, whereby a master at 25 was stifled for the remainder of his career, in one way or another. The one way could be considered as the fate of his earlier American films. These were infamously cut, recut, reshot, rewritten, debudgeted, or any other manner of studio-centred villainy. He was no doubt an abrasive fellow, but to have reels of his original negatives literally thrown into the sea – as happened in macabre twist that has forever disfigured his second feature – seems a fate no artist, no matter how insufferable, should suffer.

The other way is then the fate of his later films, as well as much of his freer but rougher European output: money. He rarely had it, and if he did, not enough. His early American pictures are defined by their sophistication of form. From his debut, he experimented with camera equipment and lighting, pushing the technology to its limit. There should be no doubt that the extravagant longshot that opens Touch of Evil would have been impossible after his self-imposed exile – an idea beyond his means, as I am sure he had many. As a result of this, his European pictures are often shaky, or beset by some technical issues. Chimes at Midnight serves as an example, with both the live and dubbed sound coming across as amateur and cheap, in a film that is everything but.

To describe the exact history of The Other Side of the Wind would require an essay (or a monograph), but to shorten things dramatically it was much the same affair. Welles did not have much money, and as it happened, not enough to finish editing the film after having shot it for the best part of a decade. As such, ten hours or raw footage sat largely untouched for years, various intermingling legal blocks standing between the world and a finished cut, a battle that has been fought nearly continuously since the 70s. The film we see now is not the result of archival digging, nor the equivalent of some B-sides finding their way onto a ‘lost album’ that often takes place among music’s late and great, but rather the culmination of decades of work. While it is impossible to say how different Welles’ own cut would have been, substantial efforts were made to align this version to his original vision, including cutting it to under two hours to sate Welles’ oft-stated distaste for films beyond that length.

More fascinating than its history is the film itself. Far from a late work of a legacy director playing it safe – Welles was never afforded such workable prestige – it plays as fresh experimentation. A flurry of cuts, aspect ratios, shooting styles, and genres. Narratively, it is a form of mockumentary, following aging art director Jake Hannaford (a loud and grumbling John Huston) as he screens his latest unfinished picture in an attempt to secure further funding. The sections including this fictional director are shot in a sort of faux-vérité mode. Welles imagines him followed everywhere by a host of student filmmakers armed with super 8 and 16mm cameras, literally hiding behind walls and bushes, filming his every move. They are naturally shooting in different formats, and so they will be jumped between at high speed (sometimes overlapping), crossing all the forbidden lines of moviemaking. Even F for Fake’s frenetic cutting seems tame compared to much of The Other Side, which nears overwhelming during its central party scene. A truly daring assault of shots and angles, its chaos in content made textural in form.

Yet this style stands as one of a pair. While most satirists presenting a pseudo-film for the sake of a narrative generally create something overtly comedic or at best of questionable artistic value, Welles’ film-inside-a-film is almost too beautiful to laugh at. That isn’t to say he failed in mocking the sometimes pretentious leanings of Antonioni’s sparse modernism – a mostly nude Oja Kodar traipsing around industrial architecture for extended periods of time certainly manages that – but rather that he has put such effort into making his mockery authentic that it may as well be the real thing. The cinematography is striking, with intricate lighting setups, precise compositions, and artful camera movement. A psych rock track plays on the soundtrack as Oja Kodar walks through a nightclub, different colours splashing across her face and body as she does. This is not a scene Orson Welles would ever direct; it bears nothing in common with his personal style. And yet it would also be the envy of so many who value this method of filmmaking. His joke is rendered with such care and skill that it’s hardly funny – a strange reality.

But it does serve purpose in the narrative, essentially acting as a breather between the increasingly intense nature of the mockumentary sections of the film. This structure isn’t without its issues; Hannaford’s film is intentionally presented as utterly bereft of substance or narrative, but given so much of it is actually shown, this becomes both a missed opportunity and an invitation for distraction. The film-within-a-film takes up a significant amount of the run-length, and as such could offer more than its bizarrely astounding visage to the larger film.

This issue, however, is not enough to derail what is otherwise a fascinating combination of cinematic frustrations that must have been building up within Welles for years. Like a follow-up to F for Fake, this film puts little value in ‘truth’ or ‘fiction’, melding and merging them into a nearly indecipherable slew. Auto-fiction, as it might be described in Doubles Vie, but also very much not. First, its blistering style, a rejection of conventional and popular art filmmaking, set on contradicting the establishment in every frame. Then, the content itself, which savagely attacks the filmmaking community, finding it a place for hangers-on, vapidity, anger, and vice. Throughout his life Welles had always contradicted truth, conventional cinema, and the film industry; in his final statement he rejects them all at once.

8/10

The Other Side of the Wind will be released November 2nd on Netflix. Catch its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner assesses Bradley Cooper’s much anticipated directional debut. 

A Star Is Born is, if nothing else, competent filmmaking. Despite the various doubts that were justifiably raised around the project – an actor’s directional debut starring a largely untested pop star is always going to be a questionable proposition – Bradley Cooper has defied these early critics and created a surprisingly functional film. Besides a few laboured shots (at one point, Cooper’s drunk and drugged rockstar drives past a billboard depicting nooses) this could easily be directed by one of Hollywood’s old hands. It gets from A to B, and gets there without any major slip-up. A lack of enthusiasm might be detected in this write-up so far, as it is that very feeling that the film inspired in me. Everything works, the wheels crank round and the script tears on, but rarely does it reach above base functionality. It is of little surprise that this is a remake (the fourth!) of a film from the 1930s – it brings to mind the assembly line nature of all but the best of Hollywood in that period.

The narrative progression should sound familiar – a woman singing in a bar gets spotted by a rich-and-famous musician who rockets her to fame, but it’s not all that it seemed once she gets there. It’s what they did before the X Factor, common practice. Cooper’s spin is curious in that it isn’t a spin at all – he plays it exactly straight. A few drag queens are thrown in for good measure (then promptly edged out), but this is essentially a beat for beat remake in a modern skin. By foregoing any narrative surprise, the film would then need some compelling characters to function in any interesting way, however again Cooper fails to provide anything more than what would be expected as minimum. Lady Gaga’s Ally is especially disappointing, nearly escaping the whole of the film with her morality unscathed; the person she is at the beginning is essentially the same one she becomes by its end, only then with more money. Fame’s corrupting tendrils are considered, of course, but always batted away before they cause any significant damage, and more than that, remains often superficial. Backing dancers might not fit Gaga’s vibe, but modern celebrity culture asks for far worse of its young stars than for them to simply dye their hair; a more incisive consideration of modern fame could have made this section engaging, but instead we are left with something that fails to reach beyond the surface.

Superficiality is, however, inherent to a good deal of the film. Again reflecting its 1930s heritage, A Star Is Born enjoys wealth as much as it supposedly critiques it. In the 30s, cinema was often used as a window into how the other half live, with screwball comedies backdropped by palatial chandeliers, droll servants, and blinding sequin dresses. As we follow Gaga’s rise to fame, the film seems to enjoy the process. It almost appears to be wish fulfilment; a flawless protagonist is picked up by a broken-but-beautiful man who lets all her dreams come true. There are trials along the way, but these never question the nature of being famous inherently, just the way of being famous, or the way of being wealthy. To win a Grammy is great, the film supposes without question, but perhaps not like that. It isn’t generally the business of a film like this to ask such questions, that much I can grant, but lacking anything else of real interest lays bare its otherwise more acceptable flaws.

Any interest that might be implicit even despite this is then consumed by a corrosive blandness as the film enters its second half. Here, after fame is secured, the rhythm falters. We must instead be sated by the turbulence in its central relationship, generally signified by Cooper getting off his face and Gaga condemning him for doing so, him going clean, then getting off his face again. A circular motion of that like is, again, not poor by design, but should serve as a foundation for something (anything) more compelling. Instead the romance develops and unfurls as might be expected, and any chance of a rousing melody replaced by the constant drone of predictability.

While drones and melodies are in mind, the music deserves a mention. Three styles dominate – stadium country/blues, stadium pop, and ballads combining a little of the two. The singing and playing is all adequate, perhaps even quite good, but other than a few of the guitar solos I wasn’t hugely impressed by anything on display. A matter of taste, certainly, but if La La Land can make me like show tunes anything is possible. I suppose my feelings about the film’s music reflect well my feelings on the film altogether – technically well put together and rarely unpleasant in a direct sense, but then so unremarkable, so flatly predictable. I’m sure A Star Is Born will become something of a sensation in the coming months, and will find itself beloved by many for its by-the-book balladry. But I’d prefer a few wrong notes to a progression so dull as this.

4/10

A Star Is Born will be released in UK cinemas everywhere on October 5th. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Yorgos Lanthimos’ latest absurdist comedy. 

In a direct sense it would be wrong to say that The Favourite is historically accurate. The characters are largely real and the process of events is not entirely fabricated, but then so much else is, or at best, ruefully assumed. But in another, perhaps more pertinent sense, it is historical, and in a way that many films more fixated on events and dates and costumes are not. It communicates a historical concept, an idea, and does so using the anti-real of cinema for emphasis. Yorgos Lanthimos has never been a realist director, and it is perhaps through his absurd lens that the ludicrous nature of an early modern court – the factionalism, the infirmity of certain monarchs, the impact of personality on state affairs – can truly be understood or presented. The only film I know to consider the court to a similar degree (only with the addition of bookish accuracy) is Roberto Rossellini’s seminal The Taking of Power by Louis XIV, which propagates a contemporaneously-novel theory of how the Sun King exploited and advanced the ceremony of the court in order to establish his personal power base. The Favourite is a sort of inverse, considering how various members of the court and Parliament can slip behind a monarch’s ear for personal or political favour.

But if this suggests some sort of dry explication of historical academia (something Rossellini is wilfully guilty of), let any fears be assuaged – though a little different to Lanthimos’ other outputs, a surreal and sometimes unsettling comedy still awaits. The madness of the court simply allows yet more indulgence, with goose racing and giant dresses in lurid rooms of muted English opulence. Better yet at night, lit by candle and torch, characters illuminated orange against a surrounding black. The Killing of a Sacred Deer might have more impressive shot composition, but The Favourite certainly trumps it in texture – never has a late-night grain seemed so courtly. And if the saturated orange of the evenings might suggest a creeping angst of vying factions, the extreme wide angles used during the daytime fully encompass the off-tilt reality in which they live. We are given only an occasional glimpse at the world beyond the palace; we’re trapped in its circular rhythms.

While Lanthimos’ form is continuously interesting, it is in his leading lady that his film can be truly revelatory. Anyone familiar the golden age of British television comedy in the early 2000s is well aware of Olivia Coleman’s talent, and to see her finally granted such a significant role in a film such as this is gratifying. As Queen Anne, she embodies the contradictions of her character fully and consistently. The most obvious being in the comedic, with a gift for channelling the petulance and childishness of a monarch infirm. But more importantly – and this has often been the case in her television work – it is her dramatic performance that rounds the role. For all the absurdity this film encourages, it is in Anne that a sense of pathos can develop. Her tragedy, her occasional lucidity, the total lunacy of her position and the society that caused it. These things can all be read in Coleman, who only has to drift into a brief melancholy to entirely shift the film’s tone. Some moments are genuinely affecting, even if caught between a sex joke and a ballshot, as is often the case.

It is there that The Favourite occasionally slips. Its comedy is generally effective and a raunchy tone is certainly not undue for a period piece, only that sometimes the dialogue feels out of step with the atmosphere otherwise created. Peter Greenaway attempted a similar schtick but got away with it, as did Michael Winterbottom in his own meta-modern Georgian comedy. In their work, perhaps, it felt a little less like modern zingers given an antiquated brush-over; there are plenty of wonderful insults that can be borrowed from the past, most better than a ye olde ‘you’re cute when you’re angry’. A similar note can be made of a recurring dancing joke, in which modern dance is anachronistically inserted. It was sort of funny, but it doesn’t quite match the comedic tone otherwise struck.

Interestingly for a film otherwise so farcical, it does lay increasing attention to the actual progression of its plot, and largely succeeds in this development. Sarah (Rachel Weisz) and Abigail’s (Emma Stone) ever-escalating power plays are engaging and their dynamic intriguing. Sarah is perhaps the more interesting of the two; initially presented as the more obvious villain, it later becomes clear that, while she is evidently a cruel and exploitative woman, she does, in some twisted way, care for Anne. Abigail has an arc that is initially intriguing – a moral woman forced to contradict her beliefs for self-advancement – but later falters into a rather trite version of absolute power corrupting absolutely. This reflects a general issue in the tail-end of the film overall – as soon as Abigail and Sarah’s rivalry dies down in a direct sense, the narrative fails to find a compelling conclusion other than whatever might be made of Abigail’s ‘fall’, predictable as it is. Anne’s own decline was a little more interesting, but unfortunately largely unexplored.

But if not a triumphant closing (though certainly an adequate one), The Favourite is nonetheless very entertaining in the moment, a well shot and well-paced comedy bookmarked by a slew of strong performances. If it slips in the particulars of comedy or narrative, it does so against an extraordinary background – that rare period piece that totally defies the conditions of its genre and its history to deliver something far more original.

7/10

The Favourite is set for general release in the UK on January 1st, 2019. It will premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 18th, 2018. Take a look at the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner analyses Alfonso Cuarón’s personal introspection of his hometown, Mexico City. 

Set in a district of Mexico City sharing the same name, ROMA is not the first film to bear such a title. In 1972, Federico Fellini released his own Roma, a series of semi-autobiographical vignettes that captured the Italian capital as he understood it. These varied from a symphony of traffic jams to a lewd display of religion-as-carburet – the ultimate aim was to create a kind of a cross-section of society as according to Fellini’s mind. Alfonso Cuarón’s film does not reflect Fellini’s at first blush, even seeming to be its opposite. It is set around a single family, is largely focused on genuine realism, and is limited within the confines of a single year. Yet it is in watching it unfold that a certain similitude becomes newly apparent. Cuarón is not simply using Mexico City and its environs as a setting, but rather as an essential part of the narrative. Every long traversal shot, or incidental detail, or lengthy tangent – these are not elements of pacing or plot so much as an attempt to recreate Mexico City of the early 70s, breathing and alive. Though we recognise the characters in them, these are, in effect, vignettes just as in Fellini’s film. Little moments that form the time and the place; this family does not exist in a drama extraneous to its surroundings, but one very much part of it.

An example might be a scene in which Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio) goes to the cinema with her boyfriend. The frame is filled with detail: a man selling bouncing balls outside the door, the subtle change from an indigenous language to Spanish on the arrival of Cleo’s beau, and an extended scene from an old British war film, just a little out of focus and subtitled in Spanish. Cuarón is recreating the world of his childhood, permitting a sense for atmosphere that might otherwise be inimitable. Orson Welles once said of ‘the great supercutter’ Ernest J. Nims that he “believed that nothing should be in a movie that did not advance the story.” Welles went on to lament that “since most of the good stuff in my movies doesn’t advance the story at all, you can imagine what a nemesis he was to me.” So too would Nims find a foe in Cuarón, I think – it is between the beats that ROMA finds its heart; an endearing portrait of a past remembered. Not always a beautiful or pleasant past, but one that feels genuine; and lived in.

Against this lively backdrop plays out a largely straightforward narrative, but one that is just as emotionally accomplished. It is best surmised through reference to another film, one featured briefly in ROMA (and presumably figuring significantly in Cuarón’s youth): Marooned. The few seconds of footage presented are of two astronauts lost in space, comparisons to Gravity seem obvious. But more relevant is its reflection of ROMA, in which we find Cleo in a situation aptly described by that titular verb. She is indigenous and yet appears an outsider – the children she minds ask why she speaks in a language they don’t understand. She loses her virginity to a man who promptly up sticks when she reveals the baby she’s unwillingly carrying. The closest to family we can decipher are her employers. They are all happy together, but there is an inescapable distance separating them. That she is an employee always threatens to undo any sense of belonging, and thus she watches from the exterior. Cuarón understands the socio-political nature of this character but decides against didacticism, instead preferring a subtlety. Just hints at the wider picture, caught in the back of frame, or in a brief exchange. Most disruptive is a student protest that breaks into violence, but even this is treated as a passing event rather than a subject for comment or analysis. Cuarón’s Mexico is not an academic representation, but a snapshot. In one scene a wedding is taking place just out of focus – the end to another film perhaps, but nothing to do with this one. A world that breathes beyond the camera’s end.

Supporting this flowing and often moving story is Cuarón’s typically excellent formal ability. His style is consistent with his earlier works in that it emphasises long takes and conjoined scenes, but is also more specifically adapted for this project. His use of long traversals to capture the streets of Mexico City are almost tableaux, encompassing details without lingering. He also makes use of extended panning shots, exploring the family home with its corners and crevices. This is again an understanding of space and its importance – the home acts as a location, but also a tactile part of the characters’ lives. This is just as true on the rooftop, where an extended shot captures the various maids on various other houses all washing up at once to the rumble of the city streets below. This may be the story of one family, but so many others exist on its fringes.

More specifically, metaphorical imagery is also employed, and while clearly meaningful, it is always restrained enough to avoid being forceful. One such example might be the opening shot, of a paved floor being slowly encompassed by small waves of water, then followed by soap. Wiping the slate clean, perhaps, as might Cleo desire in some way. We later find that she is the cause for this water, cleaning the driveway from the mess of the family dog. This image is granted additional effect later, with Cleo walking against the far more imposing waves of the sea, being caught in their violent crashing. Her life resembles this wading, punctuated by moments of suffering; it is her inescapable truth. A deeply moving moment. Then there is the image of the plane, a distant flyover that repeats itself throughout the film, in reflections and backdrops. A symbol of motion and progress, forward momentum, and at once distance and powerlessness. But all-encompassing, ever present.

These grander ideas exist then with those smaller, but just as impressive. A scene where Fernando Grediaga ever-so-carefully manoeuvres his oversized car into a garage several sizes too small is as funny as it is incisive, made all the more so by his wife’s later but far less graceful attempts. And it is in that comedy that ROMA finds its soul. This isn’t a tale of disaster even if disaster is often its subject. It is one that understands the downbeat as much as its opposite – the annoyance of the family dog trying to run out the gate every time it’s opened versus how funny that actually is. It is a film that encompasses so much, and yet remains deeply personal. It is the philosophy of Fellini’s film through the soulful lens of Cuarón, and the result is a wonder.

9/10

ROMA will have its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 13, and is expected to be released on Netflix later this year. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner critiques Rick Alverson’s curious telling of a peculiar 1950s tale.

Jeff Goldblum has reached a stage in his career at which point simply turning up is considered sufficient. This isn’t an attack on the man – many great actors have perfected the art of simply turning up, not least Bill Murray – merely an observation on this late bloom in his working life. His natural aura has become something of a cinematic style; he is charismatic, laissez faire in manner, off-kilter but not quite off-putting. And it is on this that Rick Alverson relies in The Mountain, a film whose supposed charisma is its best, and perhaps only, asset.

We open to a series of static shots in the academy ratio. They are artful each, composed with rigour and a close eye for colour. Desaturation on a brown-grey palette. It soon becomes apparent we are in the 1950s, watching the sorry life of a young boy who doesn’t quite know who he is. Trapped in a squareish world, Alverson’s film almost resembles the work of Roy Andersson for a moment, a collection of ascetic vignettes depicting a society at odds with itself. This isn’t the 1950s that cinema usually explores, not even the dystopic variety. This one is sapped of its life; it is a drab, dour, but intriguing place. To see a style such as this in a relatively mainstream American film, even reflecting Kaurismäki in one scene, is a pleasure that should not be understated – it is a look and feel that invites fascination. But this is a fascination that the film cannot sustain.

The narrative, as far as it goes, follows the effectively orphaned Andy (Tye Sheridan) and a family-friend/electroshock therapist as they travel to various medical establishments across the country. Goldblum shocks, Andy photographs; the former enjoys his work, the latter hopes to find his mother somewhere along on the journey, though her fate is ominously undescribed. There is little more to drive the plot than this, other than the abnormalities of Andy’s dreams and thoughts – he struggles with sex, both intercourse and biological distinction. It is through this general ambiguity that The Mountain seeks to beguile. It presents a fog to be cleared; a set of shadows from which a source might be deciphered. As often happens with films of this kind, very little lies beyond the visage.

But for what it’s worth, there does seem to be a fairly simple thematic tenor across the film’s length, being the nature of difference, and how it is dealt with, or indeed, snubbed out. Goldblum is the old way, the grand salesman and the toxic silencer. Anyone who falls beyond the typologies for normality as established in the 1950s is a waiting victim, better a frazzled emptiness than a potential burden. As Goldblum himself mentions in passing, like closing a camera aperture to F11 – “doesn’t let much light in”. But then exceptions present themselves – Andy’s usefulness spares him the shock, and any other position of power might equally save someone from that ignominious end. Women feature as patients more often than not, and this is no accident; they are more frequently disruptive in a male dominated world. This idea of categorisation is brought to the foreground by Andy himself; he cannot properly distinguish between man and woman, and though he doesn’t yet know this term, he instead is often confronted by the image of a hermaphrodite – an in between, something that doesn’t fit with his already faulty preconceptions. Goldblum’s worldview has no room for those beyond the boundaries of his reality, and if his particular method is no longer in practice, to drug and diagnose has become a sort of modern parallel (as alluded to in the film).

But for a film so focused with rigorous form and extended philosophical rants, this is not a conclusion of significant depth or weight, nor one that can maintain interest as the narrative begins to waver in the final third. The film might be a visual marvel – one shot of a car snaking along a mountain road is little less than exquisite – but it lacks necessary substance. The alternative would be for it to entirely let loose, perhaps resulting in a more freeform experiment, but despite its strangeness this is a film attached to its conventional roots. More a Lanthimos-lite than an American Andersson, it was never quite capable of bringing its well-crafted pieces into a substantive whole.

4/10

The Mountain had its world premiere on August 30th at Venice Film Festival. Its trailer has yet to be released.

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 75th Venice International Film Festival (29 August – 8 September), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner digs into Damien Chazelle’s much anticipated Armstrong biopic after its world premiere at Venice Film Festival. 

Going to the Moon was analogue. That vague dissociation of the digital world, with its wireless automation and computerized mechanisms, was a thing of the future; Apollo still dwelt in a physical realm that can be touched and felt. Every switch has a sound, every device a cord -technology made tactile. Damien Chazelle understands this. In First Man he takes the complex development of a space programme and finds that which can be felt. Shots will linger on faces, eyes, or a father’s hand running through his daughter’s hair. In its initial moments it almost drifts into the world of Malick and Lubezki, with wordless, almost formless moments of human interaction and emotion. The film is at its best when this mode is embraced fully, foregoing conventional style to achieve a closeness rare in biographic cinema. As Armstrong hurtles through space, editor Tom Cross cuts frenetically from his face to his instruments to his view of the abyss. These cuts will cycle like a minimalist composition, not intended to inform an audience or drive a narrative, but to convey an emotional state.

This conveyance of a state feeds into the picture at large, starting with the way in which it is shot. Utilizing old, grainy film stock, Chazelle mirrors his La La Land method by presenting First Man in the format most temporally appropriate for a film of its type. The result is something similar to a Pennebaker documentary, with long lenses, vacillating focus, and freeform handheld camera. If the best documentarians of the sixties had been permitted access to the Apollo mission, First Man might have been the result. This stylistic tenor is maintained even in a more incidental manner, where Gil Scott-Heron’s infamous protest song ‘Whitey on the Moon’ is caught by Sandgren’s camera as if by chance.

Music is also the film’s main inconsistency. For much of the introduction it is absent, and tellingly. We hear instead the groans and shrieks of engines, the rustle of a suburban town, the ticking of a coffin being lowered. It almost seems as though Chazelle has defeated the studio system from within, somehow achieving a Neil Armstrong biopic shot like Cassavetes. But soon after this rush of bold experimentation, Hurwitz’s harp-heavy music enters frame. A certain dose of conventionality follows, leaving at least a few biopic boxes dutifully checked. While Hurwitz’s La La Land score had been one of that film’s strongest assets, here his talent seems less assured: earthbound, his music feels incidental and unimportant; in space, an attempt at the grandiose always some degree less bold than the imagery it accompanies. A subpar score in this case is more significant than the music being a little inferior – this sort of expressionistic cinema can use silence and soundtrack to great effect, tapping into that primordial core of the brain that even imagery struggles to reach. Chazelle might ape Kubrick in his use of a waltz among the stars, but he misses the Ligeti that truly set 2001 apart.

It isn’t only the music that seems to contradict the documentary style of the film’s majority. My abovementioned description of Armstrong’s crisis in orbit appears to do the same. But it must be considered that the style is a means to an end. If it is in the film’s interest to be inconsistent, Chazelle prefers that to the less artful alternative. It is in space especially that various of these restrictions are loosened – the camera can be still, or float far out of reach, or cut like a cyclone. The end is always the same – to actualize the well-known facts of the Apollo mission, and to grant the audience what Chazelle describes as a ‘virtual reality experience’. If not every aspect of the film’s form functions to the same high standard, it must be recognized that the biopic genre is being twisted to deliver both realism and expression, a rarity in this kind of mainstream cinema. On Earth this aim is best suited to sixties docudrama, but when beyond Chazelle considers it necessary to delve further into Armstrong’s direct psychology.

It is that which makes up the other side of First Man’s proverbial coin. As much as it seeks to impress and thrill with its beautifully rendered imagery – both the cinematography and production design are without fault – it also intends to contextualise and deepen its subject. It is this which steers the film furthest from its potentially experimental routes and into the human interest that hopes to make Armstrong a man more than Man. Here Chazelle is a little less successful. While Armstrong’s relationship (or lack of) with Jan and his children technically functions on a thematic level, it is in need of further intrigue to maintain interest. Foy’s character is defined by her want for normality and as such it is difficult to conjure much more – hers is a story of deep familiarity, and not one developed in any substantial way here. Somewhat more interesting is Singer and Perlman’s interpretation of Armstrong himself, a man flanked by death and failure his entire career. He fits what is quickly becoming the quintessence of a Chazelle protagonist – ambitious, obsessive, and in some way negligent for this fact. In Whiplash this led to a moment of catharsis; in La La Land a kind of anti-catharsis; and in First Man there is a meld of the two. Armstrong the man at this point overshadows Armstrong the Man – there in his moment of triumph is he most vulnerable. A bold direction for a man so essential to America’s new mythology.

Yet if Chazelle’s aims were to unpack Armstrong in any significant sense, he is only successful to a point. Armstrong’s psychology is ultimately centred on a single incident, and instead of deepening this moment or broadening his character, the film instead returns to it without development. As a rhetorical device it functions, but doesn’t resonate nearly as much could, or perhaps should have. But these narrative shortcomings ultimately represent the secondary aim of First Man. The first is an attempt at total immersion – a recreation of a time and place, a feeling and an atmosphere. The rich colours and grainy stock, Scott-Heron’s song and JFK’s speech, the flicking of switches and the hatches and the spacesuits. Every detail is convincing, and more than that, intimate. This is not a docudrama presenting the Apollo mission as it happened, but a film set on taking its audience with them. And in this, it doesn’t take a step wrong.

7/10

First Man will premiere in the UK on October 12th. Catch the trailer below: 

Milo Garner reviews Pawel Pawlikowski’s Cannes-winning romance. 

If Ida was once considered the announcement of a new voice in the tradition of grimly austere European arthouse, Paweł Pawlikowski seems set on contradicting this assessment with his belated follow-up. Cold War does have some (largely superficial) similarities to that older film, such as the high-contrast black and white photography, continued use of the academy ratio, and the setting: both films spend at least some time in the depressive environs of post-war Poland. But at this point the two diverge with some fervour. Ida is a film that emphasises stillness and contemplation; the camera moves no more than three times, and always with purpose. It is a film about national guilt, about conflicting identities. Its supposedly controversial subject led it to be condemned as anti-Polish by the country’s right-wing, culminating in a petition against Ida that racked up more signatures than the film had cinema admissions – a curious discrepancy. Cold War has instead met a wider commercial success, and its camera (again commanded by the talented Łukasz Żal) flows freely. It is not so much a film about the national as it is the personal. It is not so much a film about loss as about love.

But before delving into the specifics of this assessment, its exceptions must first be considered. The film opens with two Poles, composer Wiktor (Tomasz Kot) and producer Irena (Agata Kulesza), exploring the hinterlands of Poland. They are searching for musicians who have kept the old traditions alive, recording their performances as they travel the wastes. They are also accompanied by a less scrupulous official (Borys Szyc) who sneers at beautiful music sung in Lemko rather than Polish. This small ensemble later endeavours to create a larger one – a folk music group that can amalgamate the various collected traditions into something modern and popular. Irena’s noble intentions are already threatened by the inherent artificiality of any resulting performance, but they are set further back by the intervention of Soviet authorities, who suggest the music might improve with songs about land reform and Stalin. The ensemble conforms, and makes way for, as it were, the anti-Ida: artistry that plays directly to the party line, stripped of much of its truth despite technical excellence. Pawlikowski seems quite clearly to be vindicating his own artistic choices in this progression, and again attacking a troubling reality in contemporary Poland. The conversely positive reception this film has received amongst the would-be critics of its predecessor suggests they may have missed the point.

But then, perhaps not. As for all the intellectual rigour that can be read into the background of Cold War, the flowing foreground is what catches the eye. As much as Wiktor dedicates himself to music, he finds even more interesting the sight of a young singer who auditions for his troupe. Zula (Joanna Kulig) is at once apart from the other girls, all apparently as pure in character as voice. She was imprisoned for mutilating her perverted father, and rather than being ‘authentically’ from the hills and purlieus of Poland, she is a city-slicker who had slipped through the net. The affair the two engage in might initially seem a subplot, but quickly consumes the picture. Their relationship is elliptical in nature, and the narrative reflects this. Sometimes years pass between meetings, their relationship stretching from the late forties through the fifties across borders and against a world in constant flux. Most notable is their time in Paris, in which the songs Zula sung in Poland are given new, bebop renditions, complete with pretentious French translations. This is not so much an attack on the way France consumes and regurgitates culture in its own special fashion than it is a reflection of the development in Wiktor and Zula’s affair. Wiktor is always quick to kowtow to prevailing fashion, while Zula is fiery in her dedication to the authentic self, whatever that may be.

It is in these characters that Cold War finds its greatest success. Beyond the effective acting, they are consistent to a degree that allows the elliptical narration to survive without unnecessary jolting. Each appears to exist beyond the purview of the screen, living lives we do not see but could surely guess at. The occasional insight into their meetings are more punctuation marks than full sentences; room to breathe in the otherwise real (and often gruelling) world they inhabit. At its best it reflects Linklater’s Before trilogy, in which three extended conversations reveal all that lives in between. But this strength does not follow through the film’s entirety, particularly towards it conclusion. At this point scenes become shorter, and the ellipses become more substantial. Pawlikowski’s efforts to cut out any redundancy are admirable, but some additional detail at the tail-end of the couple’s relationship would not have been awry, especially after such efforts had already been spent in elucidating their early and middle days. The characters never contradict themselves and always remain imbued with a certain reality, but film’s structure perhaps cuts their song just a little too short.

But while caught in its melodies, Pawlikowski and cinematographer Żal don’t miss a thing. Żal shoots the action in a high contrast monochrome, somehow suiting the colourful dances of the folk ensemble and the darkened basements of Paris’ nightlife in equal measure. His camera is also permitted literal levity, peering and veering around the various spaces it inhabits. To the rhythm of the music it will spin on an axis, follow through dancing crowds, or shake as the folk dancers leap and pose. The framing might reflect Ida, but the austerity of that film is lost in the music. That film considered jazz as an antidote to repression. Cold War needs no such antidote. And I suppose it is in that gaunt and tempo that it has found such an audience – in its midst, Cold War is little less than a joy.

Yet this same freedom from the weighty demands of a more intellectual cinema might also render it a little less impressive in retrospect. The film is clearly built from the mind of an artist (rather than an entertainer), and constantly hints that it may have a greater secret. The opening and closing scenes in a dilapidated church (that remind of both Ashes & Diamonds and Nostalghia) appear to be reaches at a wider and more affecting truth, but on the thin line between the transcendental and trite I feel Pawlikowski might veer just a little to the wrong side in what becomes a very laboured conclusion. There is a great film lingering somewhere in Cold War, but it seems we’ll have to make do with a very good one instead.

7/10

Cold War will be released in UK cinemas on August 31st. Catch the trailer below:

Milo Garner critiques the franchise spin-off.

Solo: A Star Wars Story is the exact film so many feared would come out of Disney’s Lucasfilm buyout.

An absolute disaster it ain’t, but that might’ve been a little more interesting – it’s an extended reference, existing solely on the legacy of its greater forebears. Of course, any chance of any such calamity had been snuffed out by producer Kathleen Kennedy, when she had directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller fired from the production. This also, incidentally, snuffed the possibility of triumph. Their directional method is built around improvisation, not just for comedic effect, but to encourage the best performances from their actors. But when Lord and Miller started directing according to their established (and successful) style, Kennedy and screenwriters Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan resisted. Unlike Rogue One’s Gareth Edwards, a director with far less clout in Hollywood, Lord and Miller couldn’t be cowed into submission by the Lucasfilm machine. Kennedy hired directors with a voice, and they were using it. She tossed them from the project, and Hollywood’s safest pair of hands was set to pick it up in Ron Howard. The chance for something fresh was, at that moment, scuppered.

But the problems pervading Solo lie beyond Howard’s workmanlike direction; the script, written by the sacrosanct Lawrence Kasdan (The Empire Strikes Back) and his son Jonathan, invites a blandness that much of the film succumbs to. Part of the issue is in its purpose – it seeks to explain every element of the Han Solo we recognize in the original trilogy. How Han got his name, how he met Chewie, how he became a smuggler, how he got his blaster, how he met Lando, how he got the Falcon (and how it got bashed up), how he managed the Kessel run. Even the significance of those dashboard dice seen in his cockpit get a few scenes. The result isn’t just an uninspired screenplay, but a shrinking of the character and the world. Meeting Han in Star Wars we might assume his various accoutrements were picked up across a variety of adventures, a long history of wear and tear. But this film crushes all of these moments into what might be a few days at most. A history of galactic derring-do exchanged for a few cheap beats.

This feeds into the film at large, replete with nods and winks to every corner of the galaxy. A few are harmless – fan-favourite Bosk gets a namedrop (as does Felucia, featured in Episode III for about as many seconds), and there are a few obscure characters included here and there for the sake of true believers. Others weigh Solo down, such as fellow-marauder Beckett infiltrating a hostile base in the exact costume Lando would wear when rescuing Han several films later. Again, the universe shrinks a little. Writing for the Chicago-Sun Times, Richard Roeper sees this filmic worship of iconography as one of Solo’s strengths, enjoying the interplay between the audience and their memories. But when so much of a film is constructed by tying these references together, we’re left with an exuberant slideshow of Star Wars memorabilia. For its considerable faults, Rogue One was at least a little less dependent on stitching familiar elements into a full-blown narrative.

But nonetheless, a few of Solo’s very best moments are born of its history. One towards the end of the film both references and rewrites a particularly controversial event in Star Wars history, marrying the new content of this film’s story with a character’s action from the old. I wonder if Lucas himself would react with a smirk or a sigh, but I certainly find myself leaning to the former. It’s a genre-moment that works entirely in and of itself, but is granted an extra kick for those in-the-know. That’s what a nod can, and should, be. But whilst caught mid-congratulations, we cut to one of the most egregious cameos in cinema history, one indicative of so many of the systematic issues with the Star Wars franchise as much as Solo itself. But I’ll leave that one to viewer discretion.

On the question of genre, Solo strikes a middling ground. Kennedy initially described it as something of a ‘space western’ or ‘heist’ movie, and it covers some tropes from both. Yet at the same time, it is so embroiled with the Star Wars brand it can never quite fully engage with the trappings of either – Star Wars has become a genre unto itself, but not one that can carry a film sans its Jedi centrepiece. An appropriate analogue would be in Disney’s other monstrous franchise – Marvel. These films, while often proclaiming their versatility through appropriating different tropes across their multitudes, generally meld into a larger mass. Ant-Man might be the best example of all, a supposed heist film that ended in a mirror-battle of superpowered punchy-men. It also lost a distinctive director to a more accommodating studio pick, if we’re still counting. Like Ant-Man often was, Solo can be fun regardless of the pigeon-hole it finds itself forced into, but the limitations are becoming ever-clearer as Disney pushes these anthology films. Edwards’ “gritty war film” version of Rogue One probably never made the light of day either, even if something just as grim – but more “Star Wars” – did.

Solo’s aspirations to be a western range a little further than the content of the film, with Kennedy mentioning the influence of Frederic Remington on the film’s visual design. His 19th century paintings of the Wild West supposedly contributed a focus on bright primary colours, but the film itself rejects any such suggestions. The talented Bradford Young (A Most Violent Year, Arrival) instead approaches Solo with a dark eye, lighting as little as possible while emphasising a dankly coloured haze. At its best this aesthetic is a sub-Blade Runner riff, especially the orange light that surrounds the initial meeting between Han and Lando. But so often it simply appears murky, brown, and dim. Minimal lighting is one thing, but to lose so much essential detail in the shadows is careless, not to mention the portentous nature of this tone not meeting the lighter adventure Solo wants to be. It might be the boldest attempt at a creating a unique visual aesthetic in any Star Wars film, but especially after the impressive colours and compositions of The Last Jedi, to fall so short in this area is damning.

Better is the soundtrack, which has always been a troubling proposition when it comes to these anthology films; I would contest that John Williams’ score is perhaps Star Wars’ best and most distinct feature, in the new as much as the old. To have someone step into those sizable shoes is an intimidating prospect. Rogue One’s soundtrack by Michael Giacchino, who is as close to a Williams protégé as we’re likely to get, fell sadly short. It imitated Williams, but lost all the bravado and power of his music for an often-muddled pastiche. Solo’s John Powell fares better (aided by a main theme supplied by Williams himself), developing and adapting motifs that do not feel out of step with the Star Wars aesthetic, while being distinct enough in themselves. The brilliance of Williams’ original work does overpower the new compositions when it’s quoted, but like much in this film, to emphasise the classic over the innovative is part of its raison d’être.

The best of the new is in the film’s cast, an element that can’t yet be imported directly from the past (not for lack of trying). Leading the pack is Alden Ehrenreich, who bares limited facial similarity to Harrison Ford and, for most of the film at least, resists the temptation to simply imitate the man. His performance captures much of Han’s charm and wit just as well, and is clearly angled as a younger, less cynical version of the character. Given most of this film takes place after a three-year stint in the Imperial army, I’m not entirely sure why Han is still so wide-eyed and jolly – the short glimpse offered of his military service looked spirit-crushing enough. But this element of his character not being overtly explained and presented might be a blessing in disguise, at least suggesting some development between this film’s end and Han’s introduction in the next.

Donald Glover’s Lando is a step better, his voice sometimes slipping into a perfect replication of Billy Dee Williams’ but joined with enough of Glover’s own panache to stand out. But here Lando is more than a rival swashbuckler – once again he has been granted a Social Purpose. In Empire he was the Black Character, a response to the whiteness of the first film, something that wasn’t unnoticed at the time. Now he’s the LGBT character, which a cynic might perceive as an insert to quieten calls for representation. His ‘pansexuality’, as Kasdan acknowledged it, is at least a little more of a token nod. In one of the few scenarios in which that term resists redundancy, we hear that sex with a droid is indeed possible. To my memory this might also be the first explicit reference to sex in a Star Wars film at all, so that’s something.

But with the good comes the bad, and among them is Lando’s robo-love, L3-37. While many have accused Disney of pandering to ‘social justice warriors’ by including women and people of colour in these new Disney films (how could they!) I have always found these accusations a little jumped-up. While it is almost certain that casting decisions are working to a sort of internal quota, the result is hardly something to complain about – what would the alternative be? But in L3-37 we have something else, a droid who calls for liberation for her robot kin, to save the metal men from their fleshy owners. This extraneous subplot is defined, I feel, by a punchline that has her declare that all she’d like is ‘equal rights’. This isn’t an interesting diversion about the robotic denizens of the Star Wars universe, nor a very funny distraction, but an appeal to Buzzfeed feminism. Can I get a yaaas? Olivia Truffaut-Wong describes her as ‘the feminist droid you’ve been waiting for,’ but I feel if ever the term ‘virtue signalling’ was apposite, it would be here. Far better has been the production of female-led stories and the inclusion women in pivotal roles – let us not set our standards so low that this blatant pandering can be considered especially feminist in any real, interesting, or even entertaining sense.

This ties into what Steve MacFarlene coined a ‘belaboured wokeness’ in his review of the film. Like an all-too-long aside in The Last Jedi that culminates in a speech against arms dealers and animal cruelty, this is another example of Star Wars attempting to deal with ‘the issues’ and coming up very short. This feeds into the main narrative, too – toward the film’s end an attempt at a sudden anti-colonial angle is introduced. This section of the film is accompanied by a bizarre set of shots focusing on ambiguously exotic women and children – almost ethnographic in character. It goes without saying that these elements appear tacked on at best. This redundancy is double-edged in a sense – as much as these concerns do not belong, they are superfluous to the extent that they can be mostly ignored without much detriment to the film at large. The Last Jedi made up for its social misgivings through interesting approaches to the storytelling at large, Solo cannot claim as much.

Despite the largely negative slant of this review, Solo isn’t excruciating in the moment. When I said Ron Howard had safe hands I wasn’t referring to his legendary grip; out of this mess he pulls off a fairly entertaining romp, and despite its unwieldy pace, it’s one that remains mostly watchable throughout. An early action sequence on a train, for example, teeters just on the right side of thrilling, even if the editing is a little frantic. But while it can hold your attention, it’s in desperate need of something to do with it. The entire enterprise is unfortunately drenched in an aura of pointlessness; a bridge to nowhere.

4/10

Solo: A Star Wars Story is showing in cinemas across the UK. Watch the trailer below.

Milo Garner reviews Schrader’s drama thriller.

Paul Schrader has always been a director influenced by the high arts of cinema, though a cursory browse of his filmography might initially belie this assessment. His work is often pulpy, revelling in violence and pornography in a manner that would make the old masters squirm; yet his influences are never deeply-hid. Reflecting what Greg Cwik has named a ‘citational cinema’, his passion for the ‘transcendental style’ of Ozu, Dreyer, and particularly Bresson is an ever-simmering theme of his oeuvre. Taxi Driver, Schrader’s breakthrough screenplay, is in some senses a soft remake of Bresson’s Pickpocket, a film that encapsulates Schrader’s obsession with the alienated loner drifting into ruin. But even with that in mind, First Reformed feels removed from Schrader’s earlier work. It carries not only thematic and visual cues from the cinematic pantheon he so reveres, but also a tone unique to their style of slow cinema. In Ozu’s geometric fashion, all but five shots are entirely still (those exceptions with good reason), and their composition dark and painterly. Alexander Dynan’s digital cinematography excels in the low light, and is at its most expressive when characters seem to slip into the black completely, literally or otherwise. If this precise composition and visual austerity recalls Dreyer, the framing device is borrowed directly from Bresson, though the journal of the film’s sickly pastor is as much Taxi Driver as it is The Diary of a Country Priest.

But the reference felt clearest is to Bergman. The film is – especially for its first half – essentially a remake of his magnum opus Winter Light. They both begin in a church, its parishioners few and sparse. Following a sermon’s close, pastor Toller (Ethan Hawke) is approached by Mary (Amanda Seyfried), a pregnant woman afraid for her husband (Philip Ettinger). He has been ruminating, and behaving unusually – he finds himself obsessed with climate change, and the man-made apocalypse soon to engulf the world. In Winter Light pastor Ericsson is also approached by a worried wife, her husband caught in a similar angst regarding a supposedly oncoming nuclear catastrophe. Both are narcissistic in their certainty of doom and destruction, but more telling is the response of the priests in question. While Toller is certainly more effective in his disputation than the more dismissive Ericsson, both fail to address centrally the concerns of their subject, and both ultimately turn the discussion onto their own failings and regrets. Though First Reformed will dally in other plotlines for a while, both films result in the depressed husband killing themselves, and our pastor protagonists despairing in their failure to save a soul.

For Bergman, the silence of God is his primary theme, his story paying particular attention to a frayed relationship between the schoolteacher Märta and Ericsson. Schrader quotes Märta in his similarly bespectacled Esther (Victoria Hill), and one interaction between her and Toller is taken directly from Bergman’s film; but the focus of First Reformed lies elsewhere. Schrader instead homes in on the purpose of the modern Church, and of a priest in it. This is first clear in his presentation of the wider Church – the titular First Reformed parish is connected to the larger Abundant Life mega-church, a towering temple equipped with three enormous screens, state-of-the-art sound, and seating for thousands. A distinctly American phenomenon, Schrader digs further than the corporate appearance of the building itself, directing ire toward the ridiculous Christian prosperity theology that claims a shockingly significant following in the States. It was only this May that the infamous televangelist Jesse Duplantis requested donations from his followers for a 54-million-dollar private jet (his fourth), under the justification: ‘if Jesus was physically on earth today he wouldn’t be riding a donkey.’

While this thematic direction has its interest, and is certainly justified, it is where Schrader’s limitations are first made clear. His delivery is often blunt, with a repetition and redundancy quickly becoming apparent. Shortly after a scene with a youth group, in which an obnoxious conservative declares that he shouldn’t have to support the poor (they’re lazy, he says), we have a scene of Toller outwardly explaining the exact phenomena we just bore witness to with his superior, Jeffers (Cedric Kyle). Jeffers gives some platitudinal response about violent video games and social media, but the scene itself serves no purpose other than to make sure the audience understood that a) the conduct in the previous scene was ill, and b) that it made Toller very angry, which was already implicit.

Schrader’s more essential point seems to concern the position of a priest in the world at all – is it better to be commercial and mainstream, to touch many lives if only a little? Or rather uncompromising, intellectual, and ultimately righteous, dedicated in the service of the Lord and his creation? I am reminded a little of the dilemma in Scorsese’s Silence, which also contrasts an idea of absolute faith against a more pragmatic approach to religion, if no less true in nature. It also reflects Bergman once again, though this time not Ingmar – rather his father, Erik, a pastor who had initially rejected a position in Stockholm to remain with his (reluctant) flock in the relative wilderness. Like Erik, Toller’s church is of little importance in the larger scheme, and this permits his idealistic tendencies. Jeffers at one point reminds him that Abundant Faith is somewhere that offers religion and worship to thousands – a responsibility that trumps the high-minded philosophies of church intellectuals. While clearly lampooning Jeffers and his corporate-church, Schrader’s critiques of Toller are not hollow – like his many alienated protagonists, it cannot be said that Toller is wholly good or wholly righteous.

With this is linked the film’s other central concern, that of the climate change espoused by the doomed husband from the film’s start. While Toller does not appear particularly concerned with the fate of the planet at the film’s beginning, his meeting with Michael seems decisive. Serving as priest at his protest funeral (to the sound of Neil Young’s ‘Who’s Gonna Stand Up’, in a dryly humorous rendition by a church choir), he soon finds himself embroiled in the climate activism of his late parishioner. Most pressing is his discovery that one of Abundant Life’s key contributors is a certain Edward Balq (Michael Gaston), an energy mogul who ranks highly among the world’s polluters. Jeffers rebukes Toller’s new calling as political – a church cannot be political – whereas Toller considers it as Godly, a defence of his creation.

This dynamic functions best when it is placed on these almost abstracted grounds – the actual nature of climate change is somewhat irrelevant to the personal and religious crisis that consumes Toller, one where he is made ever more aware of his inability to affect the world or protect his parish. But Schrader seems to disagree, with Owen Gleiberman comparing the environmental extremism of the film to a ‘policy statement’. Schrader is want to include generic statistics into his dialogue, such as the dubiously applied claim that 97% of scientists are in consensus regarding climate change, or dropping in the fact that Congress does not accept man-made climate change as factual. Schrader’s aims are noble, but as abovementioned, blunt and contrary to the contemplative tone otherwise so effectively conveyed. The film’s most overtly expressionistic scene comes off as less Tarkovsky (as it appears to reference) and more an arthouse WWF advertisement for much the same reason; the fears and realities of climate change are best articulated elsewhere, as here they infringe on Schrader’s own artistic successes.

It is this unrefined style that slowly leaks into the narrative in general as the film enters its final act. Xan Brooks notes a ‘faintly hysterical air’, while Gleiberman celebrates the ‘highbrow exploitation film’ First Reformed reveals itself to be. For the latter, it is a reflection of the pulp that Schrader so often coats his films in, this time creeping into the austere 4:3 frame of Christian contemplation. And in a sense it is the most assuredly Schraderian element in the film, one that even invites a moment of the ultraviolence so infamous in many of his scripts. But my feelings lean toward Brooks; the ever more ridiculous trajectory of the film undermines its intellectual bent, transforming the corroded Toller into little more than another projection of Travis Bickle; a Holy Man who needs his release, no matter what. This is clearest in the ending, in which Hawkes’ tenacious and brooding performance is suddenly unleashed, resulting in physical contortion and animalistic grunts of anguish. The art/pulp is fascinating to see play out, and the Night of the Hunter-meet-Vertigo-meet-Schrader final shot is bracing in its abruptness. But it is at once deflating – for the initial half of First Reformed, Schrader was aping Bergman and, with rare talent, succeeding. By the conclusion it is pure Schrader; for better, or indeed, for worse.

7/10

First Reformed is out July 13th in the UK. Trailer:

 

Milo Garner revisits Terrence Malick’s 20-year-old war epic.

The opening shot of The Thin Red Line (1998) features a crocodile dipping into water and submerging itself. The image connotes nature as much as it does violence; a hidden threat, designed to kill. The following shots, overlain by voiceover, maintain a similar visual tenor. They peer up into the canopy, capturing great trees strewn with hanging vines. This vision of nature is then replaced by that of civilisation, a primitive Melanesian village entering the frame. Caught initially through exquisite underwater lenswork, these people and their land seem to reflect perfectly the Arcadia Joseph Banks had thought he found in Tahiti, when voyaging with Captain Cook. A place free of violence, a refutation of the ominous reptile that began the film.

The eye we peer through is not, however, one angled objectively. Witt (Jim Caviezel), an American soldier gone AWOL, leads us into this world, one with which he is clearly besotted. But soon a US gunboat appears off the shore, to a frenzied furore of the native people, set on retrieving Witt and returning him to his post. With this a schematic for the film’s structure begins to become apparent. Two extremes, wild nature and mechanised man, caught in an endless cycle of violence: the way of nature, as Malick would later develop in his filmography. For some this leads to a common criticism of The Thin Red Line, suggesting its celebration of the ‘noble savage’ in its implication that the inhabitants of Guadalcanal, more than their immediate surroundings, have discovered a certain truth in their way of life. But, like all the paradises of Malick, this one, too, is fallen.

That we see it through Witt’s eyes is indicative – he is spellbound, and wont for viewing the world through a theological lens. He often speaks of ‘the glory’, and of a paradise awaiting: he knows it exists, it’s just a matter of finding it. But a small montage of shots at the centre of the film throws the subjective presentation of these people into question. Intercutting between Witt and some villagers we see them beset with strife and disease. Many have interpreted this to represent the almost trite suggestion that the armies of advanced civility have infected this hidden Eden, but the final shot of this montage, of skulls lining a wall, contradicts this assessment. These people, like the Tahitians that Banks was so enamoured with, have been warring with each other long before foreign intervention. While the incursion of the Second World War may have led to further degradation – we see villagers recruited into the US army, wearing their uniform – it was not the corruption of an ideal world. As beautiful as it may be, this idyll cannot escape the nature lurking in the hearts of men.

But Malick poses a counterpoint to this nature throughout the film, often drawing reference to a flame within, the suggestion of an immortal soul. That we might be capable of love, a love beyond that of nature and unique to mankind, threads its way through the many barely-distinguishable voiceovers of the film. Witt is at the centre of this dialogue, but his position is not taken as inherently true. Against him is Welsh (Sean Penn), an atheist and a cynic, but by no means an evil man. He is forgiving of Witt despite his desertion, but he doesn’t share his optimism. He can’t see any hope in an afterlife, and considers the war a vain quarrel over property, not morality. The spark that Witt speaks of – the soul – seems to him a grim contradiction of the world around him, a world imbued in the same nature that Malick constantly refers to. The birds of paradise featured early in the film are quickly replaced by birds of prey, with cruel scavengers circling the skies where battles once raged below; but just as they set to purloin the corpses lying still, so too do the American soldiers, ransacking and looting the Japanese camps as they break through. Malick does not abandon hope, keeping alive the spirit of grace throughout the film’s extensive running time, but neither does he let up on his bitter repudiation of war.

In this way he has constructed an anti-war film in a sense that so many others fail in. The obvious comparison might be in Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan, which released within a year of The Thin Red Line. Spielberg’s film, while not intending to be overtly jingoistic, valorises war and glorifies its combatants. It wants us to weep for their tragedy, but remember it as worthy. This is naturally related to the specificity of the films – Spielberg intended his to be about the Second World War and so directly appeals to the supposed morality of that conflict, whereas Malick’s could be set in any war to similar effect. Nonetheless, that the sombre military horns of Williams are replaced by the questioning and unsure brass of Ives is, alone, a telling account of how the two films differ in purpose. By the end of Saving Private Ryan, one might well find themselves in a recruitment centre, ready to fight the good fight. By the end of The Thin Red Line, there doesn’t seem to be one.

This is also evident in the battle sequences themselves. Most war films, as Sam Fuller astutely noted, often fail for the excitement they imbue in these scenes. In Saving Private Ryan we can’t help but cheer on Tom Hanks and co. as they seek to kill the German sniper that hunts them, or revel in a grim satisfaction as an American offers Nazi soldiers no pity: “Let ‘em burn”. Lesser filmmakers, such as Gibson, push this envelope even further. His ostensibly pacifistic Hacksaw Ridge indulges in the blood, gore, and heroism of battle. The slow-motion shot of an otherwise unseen Japanese general committing ritual and explicit suicide encapsulate this feeling – we are meant to glory in his graphic defeat. Malick’s film does not cast violence aside, but it also resists its dramatic lure. His battle scenes are captured with virtuosic poise and movement, with Toll’s camera often sweeping over vast plains, capturing the sheer expanse and expense of the war effort, both physically and psychologically. Yet he rarely encourages his audience to cheer on for the American soldiers, instead capturing the conflict a step removed.

The decision not to reveal the Japanese enemy for at least the first third of the film is essential in this. We follow the Americans stalking an enemy we cannot see and do not know. Maybe twenty minutes in their existence is confirmed by a POV shot situated in a bunker, but we can only see a gun pointed against the Americans, its swivel the only evidence that a man sits behind it. As the battle for the ridge opens in earnest only gunshots can be seen and heard, with faceless artillery pounding the field. The first full image of the enemy comes with the sight of stretcher-bearers silhouetted in the distance – an image of military care often refused the Japanese in war films – who are then promptly shot at by an American soldier. The faces of the Japanese foe are not seen until much later in the picture, after a group are captured following an American attack. While their words are untranslated, besides a telling (and perhaps imagined) monologue from a dead soldier, their faces speak in lieu. We see them as angry, afraid, sorrowful. The stoic samurai these are not; instead, soldiers. They are not all innocent or vulnerable, with a suicide bombing eluding to the fanaticism that captured many of the Japanese in the Second World War, but they are, essentially, human. That flame at the heart of men burns just as strongly in them as it does the Americans, so the film suggests.

This offers the film’s final set piece, in which the American soldiers raid a Japanese camp, particular efficacy. In this sequence the camera charges in with the soldiers, permitting an intimate perspective not offered in the former, more long-range battles of the film. Witnessing the American soldiers fall upon an often hapless, sometimes disarmed enemy does not suggest the glory of most war films, but rather an upsetting and incredible image of violence. Accompanied first by Zimmer’s effectual (and best) score, and then Ives’ The Unanswered Question, the tone achieved is unique. As much now as the first time I saw it this sequence remains incredibly moving, and, with some irony, one of the finest battle scenes put to celluloid. A monument both to Malick’s thematic integrity, and his unassailable filmic talent.

But these battles don’t last the film’s entire runtime, and I remember on first seeing the film a disappointment in its apparent trailing off towards the end, failing to build to a final set piece as might a standard war film. Yet in being more aware of Malick’s filmography and of the film’s dramatic arc, this issue quickly dissipated on second viewing. I found that it is often in the quieter moments The Thin Red Line speaks the loudest. This is partially achieved through its characters, who are often criticised as either cliched or hopelessly thin. A common example is of Staros (Elias Koteas) and Tall (Nick Nolte), who represent the noble and ignoble extremes of military hierarchy. Tall initially comes across much like the generals in Paths of Glory – a medal-chasing coward who is more than willing to sacrifice his men for a chance at recognition. But some depth is suggested in his portrayal, especially through Nolte’s admirable performance. He talks about how he had to bootlick his way up the ranks, how he is too old – how he missed his war. He feels, or perhaps knows, that he was overlooked, and sees now as his last and only chance to receive the credit he feels he deserves. Nolte betrays a certain regret in Tall, the idea that he knows what he’s doing is wrong, but feels compelled to do so anyway. When talking to John Cusack’s Gaff he sees himself in that young soldier, only with the opportunities he pined for. Risking his own glory he allows the soldiers an hours rest, if only to sate this younger version of himself, who demands a morality that perhaps he would have called for if stood in his place.

Staros, on the other hand, is also offered some complexity. While he is noble in fighting for his men, and protecting them against unnecessary sacrifice, he is imperfect. When Tall tells him that he’ll be sent home, with a desk job and a silver star for his trouble, Staros is clearly taken aback by the corruption at play. But he does not resist, or complain at this fate Tall is forcing on him. While he can clearly recognise the immorality of the act, the offer is too enticing to refuse, and he ultimately abandons the troop he (genuinely) cares for with this personal benefit in mind. Resistance would have been futile, and likely damaging to himself, but just as likely the right thing.

But despite these generally downtilt observations, Malick’s film is never lost in its grimness. Through Witt it engages with a hope, and while not a hope that can be believed in without question, it remains a consistent theme. Witt tells a story at one point, the reactions of two men to a dead bird. One sees something lost, forever disappeared; another, what comes next. This story recalls an earlier shot in the film focused on a dead chick, fallen from its nest, and will later reflect one of the film’s final shots in a more metaphorical sense. In Witt a hope lives on to the end, with the crashing of waves, and a memory of beauty. Or perhaps, not a memory.

10/10

Milo Garner reviews the highly anticipated scifi released on Netflix earlier this month.

Alex Garland’s sophomore picture, the grandly-titled Annihilation, seems to promise high-concept sci-fi. This is a genre returning to the fold after a brief absence: there’s been the excellent Arrival, the decent Blade Runner, and the allegedly abhorrent Mute – a whole spectrum of filmmaking. Following his strong debut in Ex Machina, it seemed like Annihilation would push the boat out further than any of the others – even reaching the level of capital A Art, in the mould of Kubrick or Tarkovsky. As it happens, Annihilation is less art than artifice. But that’s not all bad.

The premise itself is intriguing: after an asteroid strike, a former national park has become home to ‘The Shimmer’, a seemingly supernatural force that blocks all vision and communication in or out. From the outside it appears to be a wall of emulsion, and all to pass through have disappeared, never to be heard from again. That is until Lena, an ex-military scientist, is visited by her husband, thought dead. His name is Kane (maybe owing more to Alien than the Bible), and he’s been MIA for a year, secretly sent beyond The Shimmer. His memory seems fried and it soon becomes apparent he is deathly sick. He’s rushed to a doctor before a group of military men intervene, spiriting Kane and Lena to a compound far away.

When Lena awakens she is effectively signed up to the programme – she and five other scientists are to journey into The Shimmer and discover its secrets. They all have their own motives, though none are stated outright. Up to this point the film has been priming, but as soon as the oil-in-water wall is crossed, it begins in earnest. The Shimmer itself is a wonder to behold – think a meld of Stalker’s Zone and Avatar’s Pandora. It is a lush and living sci-fi world, a rarity in these days of minimalist harshness, but one just as treacherous as its stark counterparts. Melding is also something of prime importance in The Shimmer. Genetics here follow different rules, with all manner of fauna and flora merging and combining. The results are sometimes beautiful: a white stag, antlers decorated with blooming flowers; crystalline trees lining a beach, the remnants of smashed glass; trees taking human form, a green analogue of Hiroshima’s shadows; impossibly bright flowers on the forest floor. Just as often they are terrifying – an albino crocodile with concentric teeth, or a fierce bear-boar cross who screams with a human voice.

This world Garland has created bears little comparison elsewhere – it is a genuine marvel, and constantly fascinating to explore. While the cinematography never quite exploits this design to its full potential, each glimpse seems a privilege. But, as one might expect, Annihilation is not a literal walk in the park. It quickly takes on the character of several journeys into the unknown. Think Apocalypse Now, or Stalker, with a hint of Solaris. These comparisons do it little favours, however. While the mystery at the end of the road is constantly eluded to, as the film continues it begins to feel as though this mystery is hollow. Many questions are posed without answers, and – perhaps more essentially – they are not questions to which answers might be desired. The quest of the characters seems inconsequential, more a trip through some horrible fantasy land than a sci-fi with real stakes. Yes, the nature of the genetic mumbo-jumbo is mentioned a few times, but so what? Stalker did not rely solely on what might lie in the Room at the centre of the Zone, but rather on what the implications of this thing might be, whether or not it exists. The characters revealed themselves on the road, not only as analogical symbols, but as personalities. The Zone was unravelling their personas, despite a distinct lack of the obvious supernatural. In Annihilation the characters, besides Lena, have no depth whatsoever. A few have a single defining feature, but their main purpose is to act as horror-fodder (monsters gotta eat too) and to drive the plot; though Garland’s last film was focused on psychology, here he has created a film that does not engage with it.

As such, the film often functions more as a horror-thriller than as the high-concept sci-fi it’s billed as. Then again, it generally does so well. There is constant suspense for most of the middle section, and its toe-dip into body horror is more than welcome. In fact, that might be the best route for this film to have taken. A sprinkling of classic Cronenberg could both muffle the self-importance at play here and inject proceedings with the sort of gore Garland’s beautiful perdition could really do with. Instead, in the final twenty minutes Garland tosses his lot in with the surreal sci-fi ending, perhaps hoping he could bag a 2001. He gets closer to a Duck Soup. No, really. But the quality of Annihilation lies in the journey, the constant suggestion that fascination lies just a little further down the river. It slips when Garland’s threats of revelation grow ever louder without him pulling the trigger, not even a warning shot. Maybe he’s carrying blanks?

6/10

Annihilation is mainly viewable on Netflix. Borrow a friend’s account! Trailer below:

Milo Garner looks back at a lesser-known Bergman through a fresh 2K restoration.

The Touch (Beröringen) is, quite surprisingly, one of Ingmar Bergman’s most obscure films. It came out in 1971, a point at which Bergman’s international reputation was near its peak, and more than that, was largely shot in English. In fact, its American financiers demanded that an entirely English version be made alongside Bergman’s preferred English-Swedish cut. And if that wasn’t enough, it starred Hollywood heavy hitter Elliot Gould alongside Bergman mainstays Bibi Andersson and Max von Sydow. If any film was to act as an accessible entrance into the Swede’s cinematic world, it would be this one. But upon its release, it received mixed reviews and slumped at the box office; ironically it was one of Bergman’s most overtly artsy films – Cries and Whispers – that would finally whisk him to the heights of commercial and critical renown. But now The Touch is being rediscovered, with the BFI presenting (and pushing with some vigour) a newly restored edition of the film. As it turns out, it is not the unmitigated disaster its reputation has come to suggest.

The film begins with Karin (Andersson) arriving at a hospital moments too late. She is told that her mother passed away just a little while ago. In a final attempt for some connection, she goes to her mother’s body and, tenderly, touches her face and hands. Perhaps this is the eponymous touch, a futile attempt to reach out to another, an ultimate failure to communicate. Still in the hospital, she meets David (Gould), with whom she has a brief and forgettable encounter, but not their last. Some time later, we see Karin and her husband, Andreas (von Sydow), entertaining David at their home; as it happens, David and Andreas are friends. David takes the initiative during a moment alone, and quietly informs Karin that he is in love with her. She is taken aback but, after some less-than-vague flirting from David, responsive. They engage in an affair that will spread over several years, and it is this affair that the film concerns.

The apparent abruptness of that small synopsis is no result of concision, either. David really does blurt out his love after seeing Karin once, and Karin really does engage in an affair with David without any significant motivating factors. This could be interpreted as a weakness to the film’s premise, but it rather serves as a gateway to The Touch’s greatest asset. While there is no lengthy monologue that explains Karin’s motivation to engage in a destructive affair, which is a notable exclusion for a Bergman film, the camera speaks in lieu. Early on we are presented a shot of her in the morning, with her perfect husband and her perfect children, preparing breakfast and getting ready for the school run. On the soundtrack, a rare moment of pop music sneaks into a Bergman picture. Coupled with the bright tones and Eastman Color photography, this scene has flashes of Varda’s Le Bonheur – a reality too perfect, unnervingly so. The Touch won’t travel the dystopian depths which that film explores, but it leaves a similar taste. Karin needs something different, something to break the perfect monotony of her life. This is again reflected through the lens – the bright scheme of her home is contrasted heavily with the dark green on the walls of David’s scrappy apartment.

Returning from one of her trysts she spends a while looking in a mirror, invigorated. She is desired again, and this stands to justify her infidelity. Of course the way in which the love affair is structured in the film lends to this angle – of desire and sex, touch of another kind. Almost every time the lovers meet, they quickly escalate to some sexual encounter – they often struggle to talk of anything else, bar David’s work and past. David himself is probably the weak-link of what is essentially a three-hander; Gould’s performance is (perhaps understandably) stilted, and his character seems to lack any outward attraction that might keep Karin interested. He is often cruel and dismissive, without a shimmer that might offset these behaviours. However, his nature does allow the film to consider another of its main concerns, and perhaps the core idea of Bergman’s filmography as a whole: connexion.

While Karin seems sated in a sexually angled relationship, David seems to both want this and something more. He wants to reach out and find something deeper between the two but, emphasised by the language barrier, a distance always remains. The scene in which Karin reads David Swedish poetry, first in her native tongue and then in an awkward English translation, perhaps best captures this. Another strong visual metaphor features a wooden sculpture of the Madonna, which David has excavated from a nearby church. He and Karin first glimpse it through an aperture in the church wall, just out of reach. Later in the film we see it again, removed from its ancient resting place. The archaeologists responsible, however, had unwittingly awoken a hive of medieval larvae that been long dormant within the effigy; slowly but surely, they eat away at the figurine from within. David suggests the statue may be doomed. But he adds that the insects eating away at it are, themselves, beautiful. Perhaps this affair, one intrinsically destructive and inherently temporary, might not be wholly ugly.

The visual content of the film is stirring, and its form is no less impressive. Nykvist is likely incapable of producing an ugly picture, but even then The Touch is exceptional. It operates primarily with an autumnal palette, deep greens and browns, often framed against minimal backgrounds. The lighting, too, is beyond reproach, with subtle tungsten beams illuminating characters despite their often-shadowy surroundings. The shots of David and Karin in the church mark a particularly good example, a soft beam grazing Gould’s face, emphasizing both bright and dark. On a more direct compositional level, there are also many moments worth mentioning. One is of Karin and Andreas, while the former is deep in the midst of her affair. She sits at her desk and her husband talks to her, three rooms down in their open-plan home. The camera does not permit this gap to be closed, using a wide lens to emphasise the distance between the two, the editing cutting between their POVs. A simple trick, but an effective one. Another moment comes in the final shot, with two lovers standing away from each other beside a lake. The camera zooms out and reveals their reflections in the water, distorted by a light pitter of rain. A consummate encapsulation of their relationship, almost rendering the argument moments before redundant.

Coupled with some truly excellent editing it’s difficult to denigrate The Touch on a formal level, but its script isn’t quite as watertight. While well-told, much of the story fails to reach beyond a typical tale of infidelity. It also leaves Andreas, a potentially interesting character with a brilliant performance by von Sydow, a little too estranged from the narrative-at-large. He has one captivating scene in which he essentially plays his hand, but his feelings and experiences are left mostly unexplored. Though this is ultimately a film about Karin (who only has so much psychological depth herself), it seems a missed opportunity. The third act is especially disappointing, failing to escalate the film’s central drama effectively and losing itself in some unsure subplots. Karin’s visit to London could have been illuminating, but is ultimately a forgettable encounter that helps to derail the pondering but deliberate pace the film had otherwise held.

But even keeping these issues in mind, The Touch stands far above the station it has been so often assigned, even by its creator. Taken solely from a visual angle, this might well be among the upper tier of Bergman’s filmography, and the script can hold its own with his high average. A rediscovery worth exploring.

7/10

The Touch (Beröringen) was released in 1971.

It was recently screened at BFI Southbank as part of their Ingmar Bergman season (January-March 2018), and will be released on Blu-ray/DVD April 23rd. Discounted 3 pound tickets available through the free 25 & Under scheme.

Milo Garner revisits Ingmar Bergman’s study of a couple’s relationship.

A masterwork that gathers many of Bergman’s key concerns in his post-Winter Light filmography, the miniseries Scenes from a Marriage is the closest and keenest examination of love and identity the man ever produced. Its premise is fascinating in its upended nature; it opens with a conclusion – a perfect marriage, sturdy and respected. We do not learn much of their meeting or courting, the typical subjects of a romantic film, nor do we enter a household at war, as might be more usual; instead the film opens to, a seemingly happy home. At first subtly, and then less so, we witness this relationship disintegrate and reintegrate; there is an ebbing, but a ten-year connexion cannot disappear in a breakup, as Bergman knows all too well. His most obvious angle is one that often emerges in his work, that of identity, though here an identity intrinsically linked to relationships with others. The masks that Johan (Erland Josephson) and Marianne (Liv Ullmann) wear are to be thrown under a cold light, for them to find they have been wearing them so long there is nothing underneath. At least nothing they recognize as themselves.

Marianne in particular realizes her own mask has been shaped in reference to the needs of others – her nature is, at least outwardly, reflexive. This is clear in the opening of the first episode – when asked about herself she is only able to refer to her husband and her children; she is a wife, that term implying ‘husband’ more than it does ‘individual’. A feminist reading here would not miss the mark – while Johan makes light of ‘women’s libbers’ throughout the film, Bergman seems sympathetic. In Marianne he has created an intelligent and practical character who finds herself inarticulate, incapable of espousing what she believes about the world. Or at least she thinks that to be the case. At one point she beautifully encapsulates the nature of her affliction, the tragedy of an identity moulded by others; as the camera shoots to Johan, it finds him asleep. His own position is no more enviable, however, almost placing him in an opposite conundrum. He is outwardly charismatic, confident, and secure. His truth is, however, vulnerable. As soon as his worldly success dries up his sense of self suffers, and though he delves into individualism to find some sense of security, his reality contradicts such philosophies.

Imbued with the spirit of Ullmann and Josephson, these characters breathe in a way that few others, even in Bergman’s canon, ever do. Johan may share some traits of the director, such as his ‘retrospective jealousy’, but he is not a self-insert as many similar characters have been. Both become people in and of themselves, and while Marianne earns a more sympathetic position in the script, neither is posed as a mouthpiece for the correct way of thinking. It perhaps bears comparison to the equally brilliant My Dinner with Andre, which also presents two characters who might initially appear to represent a moral polarity, but develop into equals in different milieus. But where Andre stresses class as its key meta-division, Scenes instead focuses on gender, though to limit either of these films to that dynamic would be overly reductive.

Beside its ideas of identity in a personal and interpersonal sense is the closely related concept of communication, a staple of Bergman from the beginning. Again, he doesn’t strive for a simple moral conclusion, but rather presents a selection of responses offered for the audience’s judgement. Honesty, for example, comes under fine scrutiny, as does the axiomatic assumption that it’s always the best course of action. Initially Johan’s deceit, and the deceit of family friends, appears cruel and immoral; a later revelation that Marianne had hidden an affair from the very beginning of their marriage, however, appears reasonable with two decades of hindsight. The way in which Johan and Marianne tear off their disguises might be considered admirable in a society that values total emotional truth, with oneself and others, but the searing and irreparable damage these revelations cause must be balanced with their practical conclusions. As Scenes reveals, these fiery bouts can be just as damaging as the repression that engendered them.

But beneath the high-minded ideals of the self and the other we find love itself. After watching a marriage crumble for six hours it might be tempting to abandon any hope of love, but it can be detected, in moments and glances. This is not the romance that cinema and literature have forged over the years, of togetherness opposed by distinct apartness. Here they intertwine, and in this Bergman deploys his talent for tonal sinuosity. Johan and Marianne will often argue, but these conversations encompass a wide measure of feeling, flowing through gaiety, rage, longing, and sadness within the confines of a single scene. While a certain compression of events is necessary for the concept to function – six episodes covering six ‘moments’, rather than a more sweeping drama – Bergman never abandons the realism at the film’s core. He engages with his characters intimately and allows them the room to experience the often-contradictory emotions of a life thrown out of balance; while the theatrical cut of the film might be more intense, the TV version allows a more complex evaluation of a marriage at its end. The centre of Scenes from a Marriage relies on the idea that, in some form, Johan and Marianne still love one another. It may be a broken love, one tinged with hate and frustration, one that prevents any sort of healthy relationship between the two, but there is a connexion that binds them in a certain way. The inherent unsolvable nature of this pairing means that by the final episode there is no neat ending to be had. But of course, no such ending could ever exist – Bergman’s quality is in not contriving one.

10/10

Scenes from a Marriage was released in 1973.

It was recently screened at BFI Southbank as part of their Ingmar Bergman season (January-March 2018). Discounted 3 pound tickets available through the free 25 & Under scheme.

Milo Garner takes a look at the celebrated Japanese director’s feminist legacy.

Kenji Mizoguchi, born in 1898, was a giant of Japanese cinema. Active from the 1920s, he made his breakthrough in 1936 with Osaka Elegy and Sisters of the Gion. These films, sometimes considered in the genre of ‘new realism’, centred on wronged women in a male-dominated society. As written by Gilberto Perez, ‘women in Mizoguchi are consistently central and consistently portrayed with a sympathy that has no need for idealization.’ Japan’s intense conservatism in this period marks this as especially surprising, though he was not alone. Fellow director Mikio Naruse also concerned himself with the plight of the modern woman, and Yasujiro Ozu too, while more traditional thematically, depicted women in a deeply sympathetic light. A popular counterpoint to Mizoguchi might ironically be found in the Western-influenced Akira Kurosawa, whose women are typically stuck between wickedness and weakness, sidelined in male-led stories.

Mizoguchi’s apparent proto-feminism has, however, been criticized in a personal context. A frequenter of brothels (though not exclusively for sex), he was once described as ‘fond of sake and women – too fond of women.’ After living with a call girl for some time, he was admitted to hospital with a deep gash in his back, which she had given him with a razor. On the incident he later claimed, ‘you can’t understand women unless you’ve got something like this to show.’ The apparent contradiction between Mizoguchi’s personal conduct and filmic preoccupations has sometimes been interpreted as a form of expiation. His personal interest in opposing Japan’s heavy patriarchy – regardless of his hand in it – may be more historical than that: in Mizoguchi’s youth his sister, Suzu, was sold into geishadom by his father (an event mirrored in The Life of Oharu). It seems likely this event had a profound impact on his outlook on life, and was an injustice his films attempted to confront.

By the end of the Second World War, Mizoguchi’s reputation had waned in Japan. His films were considered old-fashioned in style, especially when compared to his up-and-coming rival in Kurosawa. The 1950s came as a second breakthrough point for the director, particularly with The Life of Oharu itself. Released in 1952, it was the first of his films to be screened at an international film festival – Venice, specifically. Here it was received rapturously by European critics, particularly the Cahiers du Cinema. Jean-Luc Godard said of the film: ‘as foreign as Mizoguchi’s language and culture may be, he spoke the language of mise-en-scène. And anyone who loves cinema could not help but understand it and be moved by it.’ It was awarded the silver lion (bested by Kurosawa’s Rashomon for the top prize), and his two subsequent films, Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff, would win the same award in 1953 and 1954. The Life of Oharu was also a success in Japan, reviving not only Mizoguchi’s career but that of its lead actress, Kinuyo Tanaka, who would go on to become Japan’s first female director one year later. Critic Jonathon Rosenbaum, writing in 1974, considers this no coincidence. For him, The Life of Oharu ‘comprises the most powerful feminist protest ever recorded on film.’

The film began its life during the shooting of Utamaro and his Five Women in 1946, at which point Mizoguchi and regular screenwriter Yoshikata Yoda began work on an adaptation of Ihara Saikaku’s 1686 The Life of an Amorous Women. Saikaku was a famed Japanese poet and author, responsible for the ‘floating world’ genre of Japanese prose. He was also famously prolific, having allegedly composed over 23,000 haikai stanzas over the course of a single night in 1677. His Amorous Woman was primarily work of satire, set around an anonymous prostitute who would tell tales of her life for coin. It is told in first-person and focuses on the lewd and erotic, a biting social critique lingering close to the surface. The eponymous amorous women is the daughter of a samurai, and as such begins as a lady of some stature, but after falling in love with a lowly page (and consummating that love), she is exiled from Kyoto. From here she falls across the social strata, becoming a concubine, a geisha, and a nun – among other things – across the novel’s length. The satirical potential is evident.

The Life of Oharu, while surprisingly faithful to much of the content, is notably contrary to its source material in tone. Described by Dudley Andrew as a ‘pure and unremitting example’ of the suffering of women, it abandons comedy for a deeply affective melodrama, following the tragic decline of a woman in society. Mark Le Fanu considers Mizoguchi’s version ‘an effort to humanize, or deepen, Saikaku,’ with its central character ‘endowed with a soul.’ Notably the version of the script first submitted to the censorship board in 1948 – and declined – was more satirical and featured far less pathos. Whether the script accepted in 1951 was a tempered edition of the original or indeed a reconsideration by Mizoguchi is unclear, but makes for a drastically different product. Filming took place in 1951. Mizoguchi directed with near dictatorial presence: he would avoid leaving the set unless absolutely necessary, employing the use of a urinal bottle when need be, and would be consistently unreasonable in the pursuit of his art, firing crew on a whim. His regular set designer, Hiroshi Mitzutani, is perhaps the undersung keystone to Mizoguchi’s production, building authentic and complex sets to accommodate for Mizoguchi’s intricate camera movements and the crane accompanying them. Takana immersed herself completely in the role of Oharu, which at this point in her career was very much against type, helped by the utilization of actual antiques throughout the production. The stage was very much set for what would become one of Mizoguchi’s finest achievements, a searingly beautiful examination of the suffering of a woman under a cruel patriarchy. But how women are represented in The Life of Oharu deserves further scrutiny.

The camera of Mizoguchi is, from the first frames of Oharu, essential in understanding its thematic direction. The first shot of the film tracks a woman walking alone, her face set away from the lens. The initial line of dialogue identifies this as Oharu, but it is the camera that has set her as the progenitor of the story, her movement motivating the cinematic space as much as it will the following narrative. Mizoguchi’s camera is unique in style, often compared to the floating world of woodprint art; particularly to that of Kitagawa Utamaro, with whom Mizoguchi felt an artistic kinship. Distant long-takes from a high angle are the basis for this style, with the camera tracking and panning across Mitzutani’s sets. This is complimented by theatrical and kinetic acting, comparable to Kurosawa’s style in its Kabuki origins. Starting with 1948’s Women of the Night this style was tempered with what some have suggested (such as Noel Burch) may be Western sensibilities, such as the use of shot/reverse shot on occasion, though others have argued this is related to technical limitations in ever-more complicated sets. One element that remains is the interaction of the camera-as-narrator to the diegesis. Contrary to the classical Hollywood style, designed to imply the viewing of an objective reality via an invisible camera, Mizoguchi’s camera is granted an agency of narration that isn’t at all concealed. That the camera might reveal elements of a scene, or focus in on a certain area, is displayed as a third-person exploration of the narrative. As explained by Chiharu Mukudai, ‘the narration of Mizoguchi’s films is inscribed within the text by obvious camera movements.’

This camera movement is used to reveal key thematic elements of the film. One of the initial scenes of Oharu’s extended flashback features an admirer, Katsunosuke, appearing outside, having misled her into believing she would be met by a man of higher stature than himself. The camera, positioned inside the house, tracks on Katsunosuke as he attempts to win Oharu’s favour from outside, following him as he opens several shogi doors; he is creating vulnerability both literally and metaphorically. Oharu’s eyes are averted, as Andrew points out: ‘if they look at each other she is lost.’ She eventually does look, and so falls into Katsunosuke’s arms – a secret love reciprocated, it appears. The camera has by now followed them to a funerary garden outside, and here Oharu faints. Katsunosuke carries her out of frame, and the camera tilts down, two grave markers creeping further into the now empty frame as it does. Between these lies Oharu’s slipper – an omen for the life she has now unwittingly abandoned, and the doom she and Katsunosuke will face.

Shortly after this incident the two are accosted at a sort of brothel, and sentenced – Oharu to exile, Katsunosuke to death. Katsunosuke’s death scene concludes with a similar downward tilt, here focused on the executioner’s sword; a synthesis of these two shots is established in a third, Oharu’s death run. After discovering Katsunosuke’s fate, and reading a letter from him that encouraged her to marry for nothing but love, she runs into a bamboo grove, her mother on her heels. The camera tracks her run for over a minute, as she tries to kill herself with a knife. She fails, but the resting frame again features two grave markers in the background. Her death will not be physical like Katsunosuke’s, but it will be perhaps as severe. That both might suffer in such a way indicts the classicist feudal state in which they live; that Oharu might live, but a life of suffering, foreshadows the irreversible consequences a woman might be subject to, even if she is not killed outright.

The camera also uses perspective and angle to convey the film’s substance. An example of the former is in Oharu’s positioning relative to other family members. Shortly after her exile she is seen approaching her new home, her mother on the veranda and her father within. These three distinct dimensions of the frame are clearly designated as separate, suggesting the distance between Oharu’s father and herself, both physically and emotionally. In a later scene featuring a potential suitor this is reversed, with Oharu in the background and her father occupying the foreground, her mother again separating the two between. Relative to the scene, the father always occupies the position of power, feeding into the general tone of male dominance throughout the form and content of Oharu. The use of angles is also key, particularly regarding bridges. Prior to the flashback, we see Oharu as a prostitute taking refuge under a bridge. A holy man looks down on them from above – a clear representation of the social stratum Oharu finds herself in. This is a shot reflected later in the film, after Oharu is banished from Kyoto in flashback. The camera tracks across the bridge as Oharu crosses, the angle growing lower as she reaches the other side. Then, in a single graceful movement, the camera pushes below the bridge and peers at the exiles travelling beyond it. The camera has, in this instance, taken the point of view Oharu will eventually occupy, implying a future already established in the narrative. Like Oharu, the film often finds itself in descent.

However, as abovementioned Mizoguchi’s style had wavered since its zenith in The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums in 1939 and The 47 Ronin two years later. By the 1950s there were many more instances of shot/reverse shot, and one of Oharu’s crucial moments is captured in this manner. Shortly before the commencement of the flashback that will encompass most of the film, she enters a Buddhist temple filled with Gohyaku rakan statues. Here she fixes upon one, and sees the face of her lover, Katsunosake, which induces her to remember all that had led her to where she now was. This interaction is captured from both Oharu’s point of view and the statue’s. In an interesting subversion, Oharu is the subject in this scene, and the statue (and, by extension, Katsunosuke) the object. Robert N. Cohen argues, via Laura Mulvey, that the use of shot/reverse shot is generally an extension of an inherent patriarchy in classical filmmaking. Women are almost always the passive object, and men the active subjects. Though this scene does subvert that theme, it is an exception in the film.

Cohen’s position holds that, while sympathetic, Mizoguchi is more disparaging to women than many acknowledge, in form and content. For example, Oharu’s daydream could be interpreted as an extension of the trope that holds women as hysteric and psychologically unstable. That this daydream finishes with a dramatic faint, one of many in the film, supports this notion. This can be countered by the suggestion that such histrionics are essential to the melodramatic form, but this is Cohen’s point. That genre, and many other elements of The Life of Oharu, are built on an inherently patriarchal framework. While Cohen’s argument is not inherently incorrect, its utility must be questioned contextually. The Life of Oharu is not radical feminist cinema, and that expectation should not be placed upon it. Mizoguchi was a mainstream director working in Japan during the 1950s; his work reflects this, even if it does subvert elements of the society in which it was created. It is unlikely that Mizoguchi would have defined himself as a feminist in the modern sense, or even that he believed in the equality of the sexes. Rather, the content of Oharu speaks to a sympathetic humanism core to much of his ideology.

The question of passive object against active subject pervades the film in other ways. Beyond simple questions of the male or female gaze, the men of the film ‘initiate the actions… carry on the way of the world… [and] are suited for action [and] progress,’ according to Dudley and Paul Andrew. Though Oharu has some moments of agency, she is by and large considered and treated as an object by the men who surround her. This, however, seems to be part of the point. While Oharu is not an empowering film by any means, that it presents a realistic world that portrays women as they were, or indeed are, treated is the very basis of its text. More curious is Oharu herself – is she an individual woman, or simply ‘woman’ in general? The basis of the film’s story lends itself to the latter, with Oharu occupying a cross-section of social roles across Japanese society from opening to closing. While some have identified as many as ten separate positions, the film implies eight distinct sections, each divided by a fade transition; this conclusion is supported by the eight headshots of Tanaka featured on an original poster.

Mukudai goes further than this, suggesting that Oharu herself is not written a psychology that might allow her to be considered a particularly complex character. This feeds into a more general theory that links to Mizoguchi’s change of style in the 1950s, here suggesting that his later films are defined by an ‘absent cause’. As writes Mukudai via Kinoshita, ‘events cannot be anticipated before they occur and cannot be rationalized until the following scene is given as the consequence of the events.’ He notes that Oharu is quick to identify with any social role she is given, and some of her actions, such as her decision to become devoted to Daimyo Matsudaira during her stint as concubine, cannot be justified by any evident psychology. His argument is strengthened via Carole Cavanaugh, who compares Oharu to Ayako, the protagonist of Osaka Elegy. Ayako, who might be quickly described as a ‘modern woman’, has a consistent identity as ‘an “unwritten text” which leaks from the “prewritten” social texts that determine her destiny.’ Oharu, on the other hand, only resists her later ‘prewritten’ texts due to her attachment to her first position in society, which she longs to return to.

While it is certainly true that Oharu is a less psychologically interesting character than those of Mizoguchi’s earlier films, and that this is reflected in other later films of Mizoguchi (such as 1954’s The Crucified Lovers), Oharu is not governed by such an ‘absent cause’ as suggested. The basis for much of her action seems to be focused on Katsunosake’s dying wish that she find love. This is an idea that might explain her intention to become Matsudaira’s lover, but also her continued efforts to discover and contact her child with him after she is cast out. A very brief spell of happiness in the middle of the film, in which she is married to a kindly fan merchant, seems to distil the point Mizoguchi was making through Katsunosuke: that, in finding genuine love, women might be spared from the worst of patriarchy. It’s hardly an ideal solution, as is made clear across the film – upon the fan merchant’s death Oharu is again left in misery – and certainly not feminist by a modern definition. But, in the context of the film, it is certainly reasonable. Cohen finds further issue with the conduct of Oharu, though in his mind she is presented not as psychologically empty, but as a narcissist. While Katsunosuke died with the hope that society might change, Oharu spends the rest of her days simply reaching for happiness; it’s likely that if she could regain her former position, she would. Cohen considers this tacit support of the patriarchy, at least at a structural level. This theme might well be identified in the film’s narrative. While playing samisen for coin on the street Oharu spots a palanquin going by. The initial suggestion is regressive – early in the film she is seen carried in one. But it is then revealed that she is not looking to her past, but the future, as her son is revealed from its interior. Cohen perhaps expects too much of Oharu, and values too heavily the words of a man in no position to execute them.

The Life of Oharu also considers another notable concern for women, both in its 17^th century setting and contemporary release – that of appearance. In the first shot of the film, which tracks on Oharu, she is veiled and keeps herself unseen; the camera respects her dignity. Not long after, it is remarked that ‘a woman of fifty can’t make herself look twenty,’ as Oharu tells her friends of an episode with an old man earlier that day. This man had approached her, and apparently wishing to solicit her illicit service taken her to a dingy building. Here, he revealed her to his students, telling them not to fall foul of the temptations of the flesh – they age poorly. When this scene is later shown in flashback, the humour of Oharu’s retelling is replaced by an intense pathos. That a woman treated with such immorality should be used as a moral lesson is difficult to watch, but also a relevant comment on society. As written by Mark Le Fanu, this is ‘the double-edged spell of female beauty: that, for a beautiful woman who has fallen from caste, there is not escape from the flesh.’ While in her position as a lady of the court her beauty was admired, but never expected, as soon as she is considered ‘fallen’ male-dominated society considers her differently.

A nun at one point tells Oharu, ‘all is truly impermanent in this world,’ but that is untrue – her past is indelible. Consider Jihei, the merchant who takes Oharu in during a time of struggle. He is kindly and respectful, until he discovers she had been a geisha. At this point he becomes lascivious, remarking on how ‘naughty’ Oharu must be, making sexual passes; finally, and predictably, he rapes her. Despite her conduct in the present, her actions of the past – generally beyond her control – dictate her fate. It should be noted that the men of Oharu are not presented as particularly evil. As Roger Ebert writes in his review, ‘Mizoguchi makes no attempt to portray any male character as a self-aware villain. The men behave within the boundaries set for them and expected of them by the traditions of their society.’ It is this society that Mizoguchi rails against. Even the women, such as Jihei’s wife, often find themselves enabling it. Yet she is also a victim – having lost her hair during a bout of illness, she hides her baldness from her husband. She fears that should he find out, she might be cast out, or lose favour. Her appearance is essential to her stake in society – by the time Oharu’s fades, so does any chance of her climbing that ladder.

Yet so long as it survives, she is commodified to an almost comedic extent, with Daimyo Matsudaira’s requirements for his concubine being so exact as to include ‘detached, translucent lobes.’ Even her uterus undergoes this treatment. A servant corrects her after she says she has given birth: ‘you’ve been “allowed to give birth.”’ Rosenbaum describes it as ‘a materialist analysis – a depiction of women treated, traded, valued, degraded, and discarded as material object,’ and in that he is correct. In fact, the only moments Oharu might feel some sense of safety are those in which she is veiled. Mukudai notes that the fall of her veil often coincides with victimization in some way. Her veil falls before she enters her long flashback; before Katsunosake seduces her; before Jihei rapes her. By the time her beauty does fade, the scenery reflects this: a dilapidated wall forms the architectural centre of what appears to be a red-light district. Her fellow fallen women seem to take some solace in their position, in that they are now free from stringent female responsibility. ‘We’ve fallen this far. Might as well do what we want,’ says one.

The final shot of the film is significant, and has been interpreted in several ways. After attempting to see her son, and being threatened with restriction to the late Matsudaira’s court, she absconds and becomes a mendicant. The camera tracks her as it did in the first shot, and stops as she does, praying for a moment to a pagoda in the distant background. She begins to move again, but the camera permits her to leave the frame – her ordeal is done. Audie Bock takes the position that this represents the end of a spiritual journey to transcendence, and that she has suffered enough to cast away her social identity and discover a greater truth. Her prayer, according to Bock, is one for humanity. Mukudai takes issue with this conclusion, seeing Oharu’s lack of agency throughout as an inherent contradiction to the ‘spiritual journey’ Bock implies. Cohen introduces a valid consideration when he discusses the desexualization of Oharu by this final shot. She is now dressed in ambiguous clothing, and presumably sexless given her new occupation. As said by Mary Ann Doane, ‘in a patriarchal society, to desexualize the female body is ultimately to deny its very existence.’ Here we see Oharu’s only escape is to totally disown her identity – not only her personal history, but her womanhood. In doing this, we might hope Oharu finds some modicum of peace.

The Life of Oharu was released in 1952.

Milo Garner reconsiders #20 on the BFI’s Best 100 British Films list, recently restored and returned to the big screen.

By late 1945, Anglo-American relations were particularly frayed. Despite their support in the final defeat of the Nazis, Americans had earnt themselves a sour reputation with their British allies. Famously referred to as ‘overpaid, oversexed and over here’, American GIs were repudiated as latecomers with a penchant for letching after the local womanfolk. This reputation was not entirely unearned, but it was also not conducive to postwar diplomacy. Efforts by the British Government to improve the situation included the commissioning of a script that might bring the Brits and Yanks closer together; and who better to front it than writing-directing dream team Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, two of Britain’s finest cinematic minds. Collectively known as the Archers, their 1944 A Canterbury Tale had already endeavoured to soften the British to their American allies, meaning they were a natural choice for the project.

This unusual premise resulted in the now-classic A Matter of Life and Death, a film as much about Englishmen and Americans as it is about our world and another, reality and fantasy. This dichotomous centre does not result in a sense of conflict, but instead a perfect balance between elements otherwise at odds – as confirmed by its daring opening. Panning across the universe, a narrator informs the audience: ‘this is the universe,’ adding, ‘big, isn’t it?’ The camera passes various galactic phenomena that are described with equal cheek – but detail is not shirked for comedy. The images shown are based on the advice of Arthur C. Clarke, the much-lauded science-fiction writer and space travel enthusiast, to ensure a sense of accuracy. As such fairy-tale meets hard fact, the fantastical voiceover providing whimsy to authentic spectacle. This asserts the thematic basis of the film, which will function both in the real and the very unreal.

Following this planetary overture, the camera enters Earth’s atmosphere, down into the cockpit of a Lancaster bomber, shot through with no chance of landing. Piloting this doomed craft is David Niven’s Peter, who, after ordering the rest of his crew to bail out, contacts a radio operator in England. Enter Kim Hunter’s June, an American aiding the war effort in England. Peter, with the stiffest of upper lips, calmly explains to her that his time is more or less up, given he lacks a parachute, and asks if she would send a telegraph to his mother. They speak for a while, and an immediate connexion is apparent. Jack Cardiff’s beautiful technicolour photography captures June in a fantastic red light, provided by her instruments. Peter is lit by the fires slowly consuming his bomber. There is no one else in the scene, save Peter’s dead comrade. No chatter, no referral to higher authority. Peter and June are alone, together, and apart at once. Peter jumps from his aircraft, preferring the fall to the crash, and bids a final farewell to June. A five-minute love affair, it would seem, captured and written with hands so deft that the inherent illogic of the encounter is totally lost. We are instantly under the Archers’ spell.

Suddenly the camera is in another place. The florid technicolour is replaced by a pearly monochrome, the romantic tones dropped for stark modernist design. The opening titles said the film was a story of two worlds, ‘the one we know and another which exists only in the mind,’ and it would seem this is the latter. I consider this unambiguous assertion that this other world is make-believe to be a placation of those who can see little further than the crosses round their neck (a genuine problem in 1946), enhanced by the impudent notice following: ‘any resemblance to any other world known or unknown is purely coincidental.’ Put simply, this other place is an afterlife – not heaven exactly, that would be far too limiting (read: dull), but where we go after dying. Inversing the ‘other world’ of The Wizard of Oz, this place is black and white; Powell’s explanation is typically pithy – we know that our world is in colour, but for others we cannot be sure.

Here waits Bob Trumbshawe (Robert Coote), Peter’s dead spark last seen beside him in the forsaken Lancaster. He was informed by Kathleen Byron’s character (credited as ‘Angel’) that Peter’s invoice was in, and he was expected shortly. As such he tarries in the waiting room for his friend to arrive. Waiting room is not a euphemism either – the afterlife here is typified by a sense of bureaucracy and bookkeeping. Even the wings granted to the deceased are provided in sealed plastic wraps. Combined with the modernism and monochromism we are left with a world suitably lifeless. ‘We are staved for technicolour up there,’ says Marius Goring’s Conductor in the film’s best-known line. The snag is that Peter doesn’t arrive – said Conductor missed him in the fog over the channel – he has literally cheated death. Inexplicably surviving his fatal leap, Peter awakes on the beach and, as chance would have it, passes by June. Romance quickly ensues. When the Conductor arrives to correct his error, Peter rebukes him: conditions have changed since his supposed passing, and to take him now would be unjust. He appeals against his own death, and his appeal is granted.

The brilliance of the film is in the way it presents this fantastical plotline while maintaining a consistent ambiguity to its authenticity. Peter has, on occasion, visions of this other world, but in the real one he is treated by Dr. Frank Reeves (Roger Livesey), who diagnoses him with chronic adhesive arachnoiditis. Like in the opening exploration of the universe, the film nimbly balances scientific reality with the romance of fiction. Much research was conducted to ensure accuracy regarding the condition Peter was diagnosed with, including and especially the olfactory hallucinations he experiences – the smell of burnt onions. Though of course, that could well be what heaven smells like. Many elements of the afterlife presented onscreen suggest that it is a hallucination. Consider the focus on various historical figures, nearly all European, accordant with the not-accidental detail that Peter read European History at Oxford. Everything in his fantasy has some basis in knowledge he has already accrued. Even people he doesn’t recognize, such as the great chess player Philidor, he may well have encountered and forgotten, in his immediate conscious at least. Diane Broadbent Friedman has made the curious observance that many of the various great figures featured on the ‘stairway to heaven’ set, such as Plato, Beethoven, and Muhammed (only the base of his statue is shown in a respectful gesture) were thought to suffer from epilepsy in 1945, perhaps a subtle nod to Peter’s neurological problem. The apparent confirmation of the unreality of Peter’s otherworldly encounters is the revelation that the judge of his life/death court case is the same man as the neurosurgeon who was simultaneously operating on him. Yet despite this, his impossible survival remains unexplained – the proverbial jury must remain out.

The life/death case is also where the film’s political purpose becomes most clear. The prosecution is led by the first casualty of the American Revolutionary War, Abraham Farlan (Raymond Massey), and as such is prejudiced against the British defence. Notably, Farlan is the only character to show any bigoted behaviour throughout, with all other interactions between Brit and American strikingly positive. Elements of national stereotypes are employed, such as the cultured Englishman and the brash American, but always with good humour. The only direct conflict between the two peoples otherwise is an accident, perhaps representing the sometimes imperfect, but always workable alliance as far as the Archers’ are concerned. The court case, which takes up the majority of the film’s final third, is set around whether Peter and June are truly in love – and, for Farlan, whether an Englishman and an American could ever, truly, be in love. The improvable nature of love is appropriate for the film itself, given the rather thin basis for Peter and June’s partnership in terms of narrative. Only through action can such a commitment be shown.

But to get to this point, first Farlan and Peter’s counsel (the recently deceased Dr. Reeves) trade blows regarding Britain itself. Farlan declares that America is the land of the free, and offers a stirring speech to its support of individual liberty. Reeves responds by claiming, in a statement about as true now as it was then, that in practical terms an Englishman is close to as free. Farlan then suggests that the jury, an international group including a Frenchman, a Russian, and an Indian, will naturally be prejudiced against the British due to past conflicts. Farlan, quite accurately, adds that Britain has conflicted with all the world, and so should face such prejudice with any jury. With some gall Reeves demands an American jury, a request Farlan welcomes. And in one of the film’s best moments, each jury member becomes an American. One by one we see their dress change to the fashions of that country, but their ethnicity remains just the same. While the reality may be far off, this is the American dream, where a Frenchman, Russian, and Indian can be held as equals under one flag. Churchill decisively used the phrase ‘special relationship’ regarding Britain and the US eight months prior to A Matter of Life and Death’s release, but it is in this film that it is first felt so solidly.

If a potential criticism is that the Anglo-American subtext is laboured a little heavily, it cannot be said that it is at the expense of other aspects of the film. Jack Cardiff’s cinematography is one such aspect that shines in every frame, technicolour or monochrome. After working as camera operator on the Archers’ exuberant masterpiece The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, Cardiff was promoted to director of photography for not just this film, but the two subsequent features to follow, Black Narcissus and The Red Shoes, both as beautiful as this one. The use of colour is wonderful, ironically rejecting realism in the scenes that emphasise reality. ‘I love you, June, you’re life,’ says Peter as they first speak across the radio – and therein is the explanation. Life is held synonymous with love in the moment. The golden hues of Dr. Reeve’s house, or the great blues of the sky and sea, are so expansions of the love that is life. As perfect as that other world might seem, it surely cannot compete.

9/10

A Matter of Life and Death came out in 1946. It was restored in 4K and re-released in late 2017.

Milo Garner reviews the Safdie Brothers’ latest film.

Like the Safdie Brothers’ last film, Heaven Knows What, Good Time is primarily set on the streets of New York. But opposing the stark realism of the former is a neon-drenched nightmare in the latter, as we plunge into an ever-escalating heist thriller. The film opens with Nick Nikas (Benny Safdie, co-director) undergoing what seems to be some much-needed therapy, before his wayward brother Connie (Robert Pattinson) lurches into frame and pulls him out of the room. This is the falling of the first domino, setting into motion a series of events that neither might have predicted. What follows is an After Hours-esque escapade, and a night that refuses to end.

Complicating this initial scene is the nature of Nick and Connie’s relationship. Nick suffers from a nondescript mental disability, and is easily swayed by his despicable-if-caring brother’s influence. An alarm bell is immediately apparent upon seeing a director taking it upon themselves to act in such a role, but luckily Safdie manages a performance subtle enough to avoid any particularly egregious characterisations. Beside the opening section this character also spends most of the film’s runlength off-screen, which might well be for the best. Shortly after leaving therapy, the brothers are seen robbing a bank, apparently to fulfil a vague sort of plot to go off and ‘live in the woods’. Whether this is true or one of Connie’s many cons (whence his name derives, according to the directors) remains unexplored, but regardless, Nick is caught by the law, and thrown in prison. Being just about smart enough to realize prison is not somewhere someone with Nick’s condition will thrive, Connie takes it upon himself to get him out – through bail or otherwise – as soon as possible. And it is this mission that occupies him for the endless night to follow. While a sound plot in basis, this also presents a further issue in regards to Nick’s character. It positions him as a ‘damsel-in-distress’ equivalent, being an object to be saved, his defining characteristic in this instance being his disability. This is exacerbated by a script that essentially sidelines the brothers’ relationship beyond the film’s opening – but ultimately that isn’t what the Good Time is about.

This is Connie’s film. He is, at best, a mediocre criminal, but much worse a person. Nearly every person he comes across he exploits in some way, disregarding the interests of anyone other than himself. Even his brother, who he clearly loves, finds himself used to support Connie’s foolhardy schemes. Yet despite his unscrupulous nature, the Safdies imbue him with a certain charm. He is able to manipulate people through a palpable charisma, one emphasised by Pattinson’s Hollywood looks against the more prosaic appearances of those he interacts with. But Pattinson here is far more than a pretty face, with perhaps his very finest performance; taking into account the likes of Cosmopolis, this is no small achievement. As the film progresses he presents a character slowly crumbling, his edifice of confidence loosening to reveal an angry and aimless man beneath. While street-smart to an extent, his idiocy in a more general sense becomes ever more keenly felt. In one of the film’s final scenes said edifice collapses entirely, and Connie reveals himself in a self-reflexive attack on a fellow criminal: ‘you serve no function whatsoever.’ Critic Jake Cole puts it best: ‘he has [a] caged, self-immolation quality,’ much like the protagonists of Scorsese’s early films.

Both Cole and A.O. Scott (The New York Times) also recognise the essential thematic basis to the film, overlooked by many other critics, of white privilege. In Connie’s rampant exploitation of those around him, it is ethnic minorities who bear his brunt most obviously. The film’s most astute delivery of its thesis is also its best moment. The heist scene towards its beginning is notable for the masks the protagonists wear – not clowns or former presidents, but a sort of rubberized blackface. The distinctly uncanny valley look of these masks is off-putting enough as it is, but more so is the idea that the best disguise available to two white criminals is simply to be black. Connie later abuses the kindness of a Caribbean immigrant, both stealing her car and misleading her daughter; and finally beats and drugs a Somalian security guard. In every space he occupies, he takes command – using his knowledge of police injustice to further enable his adverse behaviour.

Beyond this grounded thematic base, Good Time is somewhat less stark visually. Aided by cinematographer Sean Price Williams, the New York of this film is saturated and luminous, available light channelled and exaggerated. Greens and reds splay across character’s faces, televisions brighten dark rooms, storefronts glow in the street. The camera itself typically functions in close-up, forcing a sense of claustrophobia and tension throughout. Some (such as Indiewire’s David Ehrlich) have compared the film to Enter the Void visually, but Good Time is rather more reticent with its psychedelic potential. There is a scene in which Connie searches a ‘haunted house’ ride for a bottle of liquid acid, but the Safdies don’t push this scene down the rabbit-hole. Their doing so would have been welcome. Supporting the ever-building tension is the soundtrack, by the ever-brilliant Oneohtrix Point Never. His progressive electronic music, reminiscent of the classic work of Tangerine Dream, ensures that no scene drops the pace and that the building pressure doesn’t let up.

It has to make up for a plot that sometimes isn’t quite as tight as a film like this demands. After being imprisoned for a little while Nick is, predictably, beaten up and transferred to a hospital. Connie attempts to break him out, but in his inexorable cocktail of bad luck and stupidity fails this task, so he resorts to a barely-related plot to sell a bottle of discarded LSD. While this section of the film is somewhat engaging in its own right, it lacks the immediacy or necessity that was apparent earlier. His brother is not in direct threat so long as he remains in hospital, so Connie’s urgency to sell his newly acquired gear is questionable at best. Yet despite this, and some other shortcomings, Good Time ultimately delivers on its title’s promise (to the audience, at least). Eminently stylish without losing its theoretic basis, it’s a film that anticipates greatness in the Safdie brothers, even if that lies a little out of reach for the time being. Watch this space.

7/10

Good Time is out now in UK cinemas. Trailer below.

Milo Garner reviews Haneke’s latest drama.

Happy End is not a title one would expect to see attached to a film by Michael Haneke. Haneke’s films are typified by their focus on violence, malaise, and various other soul-crushing ills of society; there isn’t much room for happiness. And this has not changed in Happy End. The thick irony of the title instead hints at a different, yet still unique, feature of the film – that it is a comedy. Or a comedy of sorts, black as midnight on a moonless night. These are the sort of laughs that don’t quite overwrite the sense of unease that otherwise pervades most of Happy End; in fact, they might well emphasise it.

The basis for this rare humour is familiar ground. The film opens in 9:16, the much-maligned aspect ratio of a phone in portrait, portraying a sort of Snapchat-esque live video app. We watch a woman go through her nightly routine, unsettlingly narrated via text message by the mysterious cameraperson. After this extended shot we see a hamster fed anti-depressants to obvious effect. More shocking is to find the perpetrator behind the phone to be Ève (Fantine Harduin, in a brilliantly sociopathic performance), a pre-teen who later repeats the hamster experiment on her own mother. Just as he took on VHS and its enabling of snuff film in his 1992 Benny’s Video, Haneke is now indicting social media and its ability to encourage disturbing acts for online infamy. Initially his blunt presentation of the subject might invite rejection – there’s nothing particularly profound in an old man implying new technology will lead to societal collapse (again). But only this year the torturing of a disabled man was livestreamed on Facebook, marking reality far more extreme than anything Haneke deems fit to show in this film.

Haneke’s self-referentiality doesn’t stop here. The social media theme is continued through the story of an affair between Ève’s father, Thomas (Mathieu Kassowitz) and a masochistic musician, reminiscent of The Piano Teacher. This segment seems more loaded toward dark humour than any serious meaning: the erotic messages displayed on-screen are simply funny, and stand out against the general tone of the film. But the most blatant is yet to come – after Ève’s mother is hospitalized, her father takes her to live with her stepmother (the familial connections quickly become confusing) in the home of her grandfather, Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant).

Those who know their Haneke, and many who don’t, will remember that his last film, 2012’s stunning Amour, also starred Trintignant as a character named Georges. To learn that this Georges had killed his wife some years earlier solidifies the connection even further, let alone his chilly relationship with a daughter played by Isabelle Huppert – is this the Haneke Extended Universe? These dreams are quickly snuffed by the details, with Georges’ wife named Eve rather than Anne, and his daughter Anne rather than Eva (in what must be a conscious reversal); but the very inclusion of this mild lampooning of the interconnected worlds Hollywood is trying to concoct is funny in itself. Beyond rejecting this Hollywood trend Haneke also seems to be rejecting many of the new acolytes he gained from Amour itself. That film was unusually tender for Haneke, touching rather than cutting, and genuine in tone. With Happy End he reverses this entirely, creating a harsh and ridiculous criticism of the bourgeois, the comedic element making for an even greater tonal shift. The resulting film does not come near to the utter brilliance of Amour, but I can appreciate the radical change.

The main plot of Happy End, beneath the various overlapping subplots (reflecting Code Unknown to an extent), is the plight of Georges, who wishes to join his wife and so escape his miserable existence. Euthanasia is a tricky subject, and in his renewed disruption Haneke decides to tackle it in about as insensitive a manner as possible. This is by centring the issue on an unspoken agreement between Ève and Georges – the budding sociopath will be the one to help her aging grandpa go. This is by far the strongest dynamic of the film, and results in a perfect ending, both unutterably bleak and absolutely hilarious. It’s the kind of effect most of the film is trying to achieve, but only here does it work entirely. But it’s such a punchline that much of the film before is justified by its inclusion.

Another issue the film combats is the toxicity of the European upper class, exploring the ennui and boredom they suffer, and the aimlessness and self-destructiveness that beset their every action. The Laurent family, a complex beast that Haneke leaves unnecessarily obscure, represent all he despises in that part of society. This is, again, not new territory for Haneke (think The Seventh Continent, or The White Ribbon), but it works well enough – mainly due to the ever-brilliant cinematography by Christian Berger and the sharp performances, particularly from Trintignant and Huppert. But for one of Europe’s great auteurs, it’s easy to find ‘well enough’ a little disappointing. While many of the themes of the film are sound, they don’t quite cohere – there is a lingering sense that the film is incomplete, that all but Georges’ story lack that necessary conclusion to bring the narrative together. But even as a lesser work of Haneke, Happy End is still surprisingly funny, and vicious enough to remain engaging despite its faults.

7/10

Happy End premiered on October 9th in the UK, at London Film Festival. It will be out in UK cinemas from December 1st. Watch the trailer below.

Milo Garner examines Claire Denis’ latest dramatic feature.

Michael Hanake’s Happy End seemed novel in its comedic contrast to his typically austere filmography, but he isn’t alone in this sudden change of direction. Claire Denis, French auteur extraordinaire, is director and co-writer (with acclaimed French novelist Christin Angot) of Let the Sunshine In, which might well be described as a rom-com. Far from the incestuous child rape of 2013’s Bastards, Denis’ latest concerns a wayward artist caught out of love. But, again like Hanake, Denis is remains in a thematic ballpark unmistakably hers; and though playing for a dry humour unseen in most of her work, she doesn’t settle for smiles all round.

Let the Sunshine In centres on Juliette Binoche’s Isabelle. The film opens with striking imagery of her in bed with a bulbous banker, Vincent (Xavier Beauvois). This uneven pairing is slowly explained as the narrative unfolds, with Isabelle unsure of herself – and unsure why she stays with Vincent despite his clear repugnancy, moneyed or not. One reason she offers is that by considering what a bastard he is, she is able to orgasm. But despite this seeming detachment from him emotionally, his cutting words – including the gem, ‘you are charming, but my wife is extraordinary’ – still seem to bite. As such Isabelle flows from one man to the next, her subsequent quarry a young and infuriatingly indecisive actor (Denis regular Nicolas Duvauchelle). Compared to Vincent he is far less interested in sex, and more in trying to build an emotional connexion, if one Isabelle is not necessarily aware of. A moment of the dry comedy that is infused throughout the film is the conversation the two have concerning their happiness that they have finally decided to stop talking. Denis might generally be a more visually focused director, but here there is a lot of talk – too much, as the point might be.

Other men Isabelle oscillates between include fellow artist Marc (Alex Descas, another familiar face for Denis), who is gentle but old; her ex-husband François (Laurent Grevill); and an attractive man she meets on the dancefloor (Paul Blain) who is outside of her ‘milieu’. That’s at least according to Fabrice (Bruno Podalydès), a jealous gallerist who, like many of the others, seems to have fallen for Isabelle. But therein is her problem: her inability to find any fulfilling connexion to any of these men. The question of the film, as posed by David Ehrlich in his review for IndieWire, is ‘what is one to do when they’re not in love?’ It is that flame Isabelle chases, but it’s predictably elusive. Less predictable, however, is the manner in which Denis approaches this problem. Rather than focusing on sex or the conventional pitfalls of affairs, she instead focuses on conversations between Isabelle and these men. The relationships are often elliptical or even off-screen, in the case of Vincent and François. After Fabrice questions her relationship with Paul Blain’s character, for example, she finds herself frayed and confronts her partner. We had only seen their meeting formerly, but much of their wider dynamic is portrayed in this single interaction.

This structural interest is matched by formal execution, particularly, as usual, in Agnes Godard’s camerawork. The use of colour and composition are faultless, as are some moments of motion. One such moment is a conversation between Vincent and Isabelle, captured as the camera pans and tracks between the two, so that they rarely share a frame. The rhythm of this movement means that we are often shown the reaction of a character, particularly Isabelle, rather than their lines, and so gain insight into the more important subtext to their relationship at that time. For Vincent this is a meaningless fling; Isabelle’s face doesn’t agree. This is naturally enabled by Binoche’s performance, which is typically excellent, managing both the dramatic heft of the film and its occasional comedic flourishes. For example, during a tour of Fabrice’s countryside abode – where he waxes lyrically on what it is to own the vast and pleasant lands at his disposal, and just at the moment I worry the film might be taking him seriously – Isabelle explodes in rebuttal to Fabrice’s self-aggrandizing pretensions. Gratifying and amusing. Another is the appearance of Gerard Depardieu as a kind of new-age relationship counsellor. As the credits play over the extended scene, Depardieu offers hollow advice to be ‘open’ to Isabelle, all the while subtly (or not so subtly) implying that he is her best option in love. But as abovementioned, the film is not necessarily playing for laughs, though it recognises the inherent comedy in its themes; themes Denis has formerly covered through a more serious lens (Friday Night, for example). This doesn’t, however, revoke Let the Sunshine In of its thematic power, even if it doesn’t quite reach the heights of her best.

8/10

Let the Sunshine In premiered in the UK on the 13th of October, at London Film Festival. Trailer below.

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Guadagnino’s seductive feature.

Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me By Your Name is a film defined less by its content, which is that of an almost rote coming-of-age romance, than by its form. The summer romance between Elio (Timothée Chalamet) and Oliver (Armie Hammer) is hardly unique, but under that Italian sun Guadagnino captures the moment inimitably. That is how Call Me By Your Name might best be described – a film of moments. Stolen glances, soft touches, a midnight tryst; these are not only captured through Mukdeeprom’s soft lens, but felt.

It’s 1983, and the setting is a non-specific idyll in North Italy. Mr. Perlman (Michael Stuhlbarg) brings his family here annually, but this year he also invites a young doctoral student. This student, Oliver, is there to aid him in his academic pursuits, but the arrangement seems rather lax. It is here he meets Elio, Perlman’s son, who exists as a type of counterpoint to Oliver in a very physical sense. Chalamet embodies the seventeen-year-old Elio, cutting a slim, even dainty figure. He is fragile in more than appearance, however, his expert touch on piano and guitar emphasising his nimble form, especially when playing the delicate melodies of Debussy. Hammer’s Oliver is, conversely, a kind of modern Adonis. Cast far older than his character to emphasise the age-gap in André Aciman’s novel, Oliver brims with confidence of a particularly American brand. Elio first mocks his cursory farewell, ‘later’, but it clearly figures into his charm. The age-gap is interesting in of itself, as it could easily fall into the trap of exploitation, or the appearance of such. Restraint, both in writing and direction, veer away from this pitfall. Oliver, though making the initial play, is subtle and reserved concerning his interest – Elio is ultimately in control of anything that may take place.

Subtle and reserved might well be bywords for Call Me By Your Name, which sees Guadagnino tone down his fairly loud style to emphasise the excellent performances at the film’s centre. The oft-mentioned ‘peach scene’ has been tempered substantially, though even then it seems a little out of place; the kind of thing that works better on the page in this instance. Rather than embracing the explicit, the film relies on its romantic tension to maintain interest. In its early sections the camera is keen to emphasise distance between the two leads, making sure to spot those glances that last a little too long, the doors left a little too ajar: the signs of an unspoken understanding. This naturally leads to a discussion on the context – in 1983 homosexuality was far from accepted, and so one might expect this film, as many others of the queer genre, to introduce the theme of intolerance around this point. However, it remains thankfully absent. The ghoul of homophobia exists only as a vague undertone, such as a reluctance to kiss in public; there is no antagonist hoping to out them to the world, no cruel parent that might split up the young lovers. This allows the film to breathe, and leaves it able to present the romance without an unnecessary creeping jeopardy.

The only conflict to feature prominently is internal, with Elio coming to terms with his sexuality and relationships. Alongside Oliver is Marzia (Esther Garrel), who is described accurately by Sight & Sound’s Paul O’Callaghan as a ‘part-time girlfriend’. Friends from childhood, the pairing probably seemed natural to Elio, as would his attempts to consummate this relationship. But there is a sense that it might be a form of compensatory posturing, such as when he brazenly declares to Oliver that he could have had sex with her the night before. Is this an assertion of heterosexuality against his internal confusion, or an attempt to gauge Oliver’s reaction? Very possibly a mix of the two. Elio’s father plays a curious role in this burgeoning romance, especially during a scene in which he discusses the shape of Greco-Roman sculpture with Oliver. ‘There’s not a straight body among them,’ he says, ‘they’re all curved.’ And in a moment of perhaps excessive blatancy, they’re ‘daring you to desire them.’ This light encouragement is, again, refreshing for the genre, and permits the audience to drop their guard.

After Elio and Oliver’s romance eventually blossoms, another feature of the film becomes particularly apparent – the soundtrack. Beyond Ryuichi Sakamoto’s graceful piano and some diegetic tunes of the 80s are a trio of songs by Sufjan Stevens, acclaimed folk singer-songwriter picked specifically by Guadagnino. After deciding there would be no narration in a traditional sense, Guadagnino thought the songs of Sufjan could be used as a form of meta-narrative – a contemporary voice to describe the emotion of a remembered past. The first song featured is a reworking of ‘Futile Devices’, a song that concerns a delicate and wordless love, and one that beautifully encapsulates the moment Elio and Oliver pass the bounds of friendship. The two other songs, ‘Visions of Gideon’ and ‘Mystery of Love’ are new compositions, and both also overlay essential moments in Elio and Oliver’s relationship, tracing the supple line between tenderness and dejection. After all, this is a romance of inevitable brevity, a moment in the sun.

8/10

Call Me By Your Name premiered on the 9th of October at London Film Festival. It’s out in UK cinemas on the 27th. Watch the trailer below:

Milo Garner takes on the blockbuster revisiting of an iconic scifi realm.

Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner is one of the pillars of sci-fi cinema, one of the two masterpieces that crystalized his pantheon position amongst directors (otherwise unearned). Though Phillip K. Dick’s source material underpinned Blade Runner with thematic strength, it wasn’t for its intellectualism that it became so acclaimed. Its heavy sense of atmosphere and style is its crowning achievement; in Scott’s vision, musing on what it means to be human is certainly important, but secondary. The atmosphere is instantly recognizable – a neon and crowded Los Angeles, beaten by constant rain; a future dominated by East Asian influence. Interiors resemble more noir than science fiction film, with ceiling fans revolving over lingering smoke. Dark rooms are sharply-lit through half-open blinds.

Blade Runner 2049, directed by sci-fi’s new kid on the block Denis Villeneuve, seems aware of this legacy, but stands markedly apart. Like its predecessor it is in style that the film truly excels – but 2049’s is not a style of the same kind. The film is characterized by its use of negative space, with saturated colours and sparsely beautiful compositions a constant throughout. The gritty and physical world of Scott’s film is replaced by one far more typically ‘sci-fi’, clean and bright. This results in both amazement at the visual palette delivered by the ever-excellent Roger Deakins, who imbues every frame with a sense of splendour rarely witnessed in cinema. But there is also a sense of sterility, a loss of the beating heart that gave the original such life and longevity. The short time this new film actually spends at street-level, despite its best efforts, is too beautiful to be dingy. Writing for Slant, Chuck Bowen notes that K (Ryan Gosling) gets his noodles from a machine, while Deckard had bought his from a street vendor, suggesting a conscious decision to present a world less ‘human’. This general theme seems to have carried over to the visual tone.

In terms of visuals the production design must also be considered, to similar conclusions. While Scott’s film purposefully presented anachronistic elements to create a sense of genre – the detective noir in that case – Villeneuve pushes his vision far in the other direction. While in Blade Runner the Tyrell headquarters were bathed in an otherworldly golden hue, Wallace’s (Jared Leto) base of operations is instead drowning in its orange tint. And while the former reflected the abode of an exuberant man, the latter is closer to the interior of some lost Egyptian tomb, breathtakingly vast and stunningly realized. This general theme is repeated throughout: the original film preferred an inky reinterpretation of recognisable locales; the new pushes for unseen scope and scale. Even a location that might be relatable – a run-down casino – takes on a mythological appearance, with towering statues engulfed by a sandy haze just outside. Yet while there are countless frames of the film that might make for a masterful printout – many more than in Scott’s film – they are also less suited for the detective slow-burn that both Blade Runners remain. The film’s leisurely 163 minutes allow for a wonderful tour of these incredible sights, but there is a pining for the creeping shadow the first film realized so brilliantly.

Beyond its look, the film also sounds mesmeric. Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch succeeding Vangelis with surprising confidence. The music of Blade Runner was essential to its success, and about as influential as the visuals were for later sci-fi cinema. Zimmer and Wallfisch reflect this by retaining the synth-heavy tone of Vangelis’ soundtrack, while introducing a soundscape-style ambience and all-encompassing bass, signatures of Zimmer’s specific brand of score. Jóhann Jóhannsson, Villeneuve’s regular composer, had originally been the sole composer for 2049, but was later replaced; it seems the intent was to come closer to the sound of Vangelis. In this aim the film undoubtedly succeeds, imbuing 2049 with a genetic link to its forerunner otherwise forgone in the film’s cinematography.

Filling the film’s lofty world is a story a little less grand, but nonetheless functional. It takes place thirty years after the original (who’d have guessed?) The time-jump is filled by the fall of the Tyrell Corp and its replacement by Niander Wallace, who builds a new, more obedient, form of replicant. Any of the remaining older models, such as the original film’s protagonist, must be hunted down by blade runners. One such blade runner is K, a self-aware replicant of the new kind who finds himself pining for some sense of everyday life. While the original leaves a lot of the implications regarding replicants up to the viewer, 2049 is more direct – the term slave is said several times, and it is mentioned that a gap must be maintained between ‘us and them’. K receives verbal abuse from passing humans on top of this – even respected replicants such as himself are second-class citizens in this world. At home he plays Frank Sinatra and is waited on by his ideal woman, Joi. The twist is that she’s not a woman, nor even a replicant, but a hologram. Initially this strikes one as incredibly artificial, fraudulent as the holographic dinner she places over his vending machine noodles. But the thought process that follows naturally leads to the acknowledgement that we thought the very same of replicants initially – could this cheaper model of artificial intelligence not, too, ‘be’? Unfortunately the film does not engage with this question further than its surface implications, with Joi saying little of interest across her scant dialogue. Rachael didn’t have an enormous role in the first film, occupying an equivalent position, yet managed to challenge the audience far more than this new character ever does. The questioning, in this instance, is left to us.

After completing an assignment K discovers an impossibility – a replicant that has given birth. His superior, Joshi (Robin Wright), worries about what this might mean for the relationship between human and replicant, and so demands the evidence of this event be destroyed entirely. It is here the film flails a little thematically, since its assertion that reproduction – birth – is essential to ‘being’ is not as self-evident as presented. To be born or not has little bearing on the themes of Dick’s text or Scott’s film, and though the film does acknowledge this eventually, it seems too obvious from the start. More interesting perhaps is the film’s concern with memory, the way in which it defines identity, and the problem of duplicate memories in relation to this. Again, this isn’t explored in particular depth, but K’s journey does allow 2049 to revisit many of the ideas of the first film from a different angle, so engaging with them again if not necessarily offering much expansion or improvement.

The antagonists in 2049 are another stumbling block, mainly for their overt villainy. A good example is Tyrell versus Wallace – while the former could pass off as a businessman with wider, perhaps unhinged, ambitions, the latter is nothing less than an evil mastermind. He talks of his replicants as ‘angels’ in a slow and grandiose tone – it’s difficult to consider that he is from the same world those of the first film inhabited. Worse is his replicant assistant, Luv (Sylvia Hoeks), who is incredibly malicious without any particular reason. In one case she causes K incredible pain and then, bizarrely, leaves him alive. A robotic malfunction, or lazy narrative device? Another of the big questions to ponder.

Blade Runner 2049 is an interesting film, and manages to be both astounding and remarkably unengaging at various points across its lengthy runtime. Versus the original its slow burn does not function nearly as well, though on the larger sci-fi scene it manages visuals that few other films could compete with. However, that a three decades-delayed sequel to Blade Runner, a film that did not imply a follow-up of any sort, managed to avoid being a total disaster is something to be celebrated.

7/10

Blade Runner 2049 is out now in UK cinemas. Check out the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner examines Linklater’s latest.

Richard Linklater is famed for his varied filmography, but he is not merely a genre-hopper. His work can also be divided into two distinct parts. On one hand there would be the Before trilogy, Boyhood, and Waking Life, all of which might be described as art films. On the other, Bernie, School of Rock, and indeed, Last Flag Flying: his more commercial work. This division can be used to denigrate some of his output, with Linklater’s films often divided on the same line as ‘greater’ and ‘lesser’ – but even if mostly true, that isn’t to say the second set of films fail in their aims. Then again, you might be forgiven for thinking so in regards to Last Flag Flying. Its cinematography is grey and workmanlike – that is to say, uninteresting, despite the smooth editing that accompanies it. The synopsis sounds like a sort of typical flag-waver army-weeper, and the less said of the soundtrack the better. Despite these issues, however, the film impresses with its strongly written characters and matching performances.

Larry ‘Doc’ Sheffield (Steve Carell in another semi-serious role) tracks down an old friend, and finds him running a mostly deserted dive bar. This friend is Sal (Bryan Cranston), with whom Doc once served in Vietnam. After spending a while together, Doc has Sal drive him to the church of Reverend Richard Mueller (Laurence Fishburne), another who served with Doc thirty years prior. Shortly afterward Doc reveals his purpose – his son, a marine, has been killed in action in Baghdad, and he wishes to see him off with those he fought with. It seems the stage is set for some wartime sob-stories, but what unfolds isn’t quite as expected. Instead of acting as a vehicle for military praise, the film takes an anti-establishment route, and raises issue with the military directly. Given the 2003 setting, many of its themes are admittedly dated – it is generally accepted that the Iraq War is a Bad Thing, that the government lies, and that the military isn’t an infallible beacon of Americanism. Nonetheless, these ideas are communicated fairly well, if bluntly, and do inform the narrative enough to be justified. One fairly novel aspect is the direct comparison of the Iraq War to Vietnam, which isn’t laboured too heavily yet functions to marry the memories of the main cast to the realities of their present excellently. Of course there is only so far repeating ‘why were our young boys over there anyway?’ can really take a narrative, but luckily that’s not the main event.

That would be the three men at the centre of it all, each well-realized and thoroughly entertaining. The group has innate chemistry. First there’s Doc, typically meek and downbeat, and clearly quite easily influenced. He is a good man given a bad lot, making those few moments he does crack a smile all the more satisfying. Carell has recently had a bout of serious or semi-serious roles, and he always delivers; it’s impossible not to sympathise with his weary performance here. Beside him is Fishburne’s Mueller, once infamous in the war, now very much reformed. We might call it overcompensating, being an ordained priest and all. While his performance initially belies a sense of stiltedness, this is later justified – really he’s an expert at repressing his authentic self, which breaks through every once in a while in foul-mouthed fury. Mueller, in contrast to Doc’s good man beset with bad, is a bad man beset with good. Then comes Sal, by far the most entertaining of the three. But don’t take that to mean he’s some kind of unrealistic comic relief – he is unmistakably real, his (presumably) bad breath almost palpable through the screen. He misses his days as a marine and has done little with his time since, maintaining the rowdy humour soldiers are known for. He is brash, has problems with authority, but sees a sense of justice in total honesty. Cranston utterly hits the mark in portrayal, managing a performance both innately charismatic yet simultaneously repulsive – Sal is the Bad Friend you can’t help but stick by. These three also make up a comment on the long-term effects of war and how people cope with it – Doc found family, Mueller found God, and Sal found the bottle. A fourth spot at the table remains unfilled: the member of their unit who didn’t make it back.

These characters work their best when interacting. Their chemistry is genuine and provides the film its comedic backbone. One scene, in which the three old men decide to buy flip phones (now cleared for nostalgia, it seems), is especially effective in its portrayal of aged naivety when it comes to new technology. Their group confoundment at the idea of 500 minutes a month of talk time is both ridiculous yet humanly warm. Another in which they discuss their old ‘war stories’ (that is, their time spent in ‘Disneyland’, the makeshift brothels around military camps) is similarly strong, again evoking a sense these are real people as opposed to inserted military stereotypes. That isn’t to say they don’t sometimes reminisce about the horror of bullets whizzing over dugouts, as would be expected, but their characters are rounded otherwise. Sal, for example, seems at odds with himself, both claiming that he’s thankful the war is over for him, yet also yearning for it. Not so much for the violence and horror, but for the times when he was at his peak – proud, young, and able, though not quite noble. This is Linklater’s ultimate success with Last Flag Flying. Though it’s technically unimpressive and its narrative and themes are not quite as interesting as they could be, he has created a set of authentic characters inhabited by actors talented enough to fully realize them.

7/10

Last Flag Flying had its UK premiere at London Film Festival on the 8th of October. Trailer below.

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner considers Dee Rees’ historical drama from the LFF Headline Gala programme.

Mudbound opens with a visual metaphor that informs its entirety. Two brothers, Henry and Jamie McAllen (Jason Clarke and Garret Hedlund) are digging a grave for their father, when they come upon chains, then skeletal remains. A slave’s grave, one observes. Just under the surface of America lies its terrible legacy. It’s one some might shy away from, but it will inevitably be unearthed.

The film, set around and during the Second World War, follows two families living on a farm in Mississippi: one black, one white. The latter is headed by newlyweds Henry and Laura (Carey Mulligan), who decides to move to the farmland to fulfil a dream of his. They settle on the land and quickly assert themselves as landowners. Henry visits the black family – the Jacksons – now under his employ, and softly demands that they help him unpack. This will be a theme throughout the film – Henry’s loud knock on the door signalling a request that dare not be denied. Henry isn’t an ‘active’ racist, as it might be termed, but he has behind him the coercion of white America, and will happily stand by as his very racist father (Jonathan Banks) splutters demeaning and insulting language. He represents the typical man of his position – rarely an active aggressor but guilty all the same. Director Dee Rees realizes this power balance excellently, backed by Clarke’s subtle performance – he isn’t played as a villain, but his leanings are clear enough.

Hap (Rob Morgan) is the head of the Jacksons and, presumably due to his age, is wary of disobeying even unreasonable demands by his white employers. He attempts to guide his family towards peace with the McAllens, and for much of the first half of the film largely succeeds. Betraying its literary roots, the story has a lot of disposable subplots and characters introduced who, while developing the core players, have little to add to the essence of the film. In fact, this essence only becomes clear halfway through, after Ronsel Jackson (Jason Mitchell) and Jamie have both returned from the Second World War. On their return they are changed men. Admittedly we didn’t know them (especially Ronsel) much before the war or earlier in the film, but the rest of the narrative is theirs. Ronsel, having tasted a hint of equality overseas, is no longer willing to supplicate himself to the powers that be. This encapsulates a historical phenomenon of the time that pushed the civil rights movement, and is excellently portrayed here. Jamie has a similar experience, his life being saved by a black fighter pilot, resulting in him swearing he’ll do some good as a result.

This progresses into an authentic friendship between the two. Rather than the two immediately bonding (as soldiers might), there is a fair level of reticence, especially (and naturally) on the part of Ronsel. Overcoming the hard-set racial distrust is no easy thing, even in this context. From here on the film considers their friendship in regards to the precarious balance between the two families of the farm, and an attempt to bridge the gap is ultimately what ensures the tragedy rumbling under the surface will come to the fore. Given the quality of this second half the aimlessness of the first is only made clearer – much of the it could be cut while retaining most of the film’s emotional strength, especially given that Jamie and Ronsel feature only occasionally in early scenes.

A further issue compounding this is the editing, which is initially a little unsure. Cutting between the two families, often without direct dramatic purpose, can be jarring enough, but it gets worse when the war is introduced. While intercutting drama both sides of the Atlantic might function on paper, it’s awkwardly realized here, especially given the lack of substance in the battle scenes. Seeing characters we don’t know too well caught up in context-free ‘war stuff’ is not particularly compelling, even if some events will be revisited later on. Luckily, however, the camerawork is a step above, with some wonderful pastoral imagery. An opportunity is lost in texture, however. The narration is not short on reminding the audience that anything and everything on the farm is mud-caked, but this is not emphasised in any particular way visually. Again, the literary roots of the film rear their head.

Mudbound’s third act follows the tragic trajectory to its natural conclusion, and although predictable it functions as an effective payoff nonetheless. Unfortunately the film fails to conclude on the scene that opened it, with a ‘studio ending’ type thing tacked on the final few minutes; fortunately, it isn’t destructive enough to undo what comes before. While an imbalanced and uneven affair, Dee Rees has still managed to create an intermittently strong and accessible film, whose qualities certainly outweigh its faults.

7/10

Mudbound premiered in the UK on the 5th of October at London Film Festival. Trailer below: 

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Takashi Miike’s impressive 100th film.

A samurai stands against a vast horde of mercenaries, his young charge their last victim. The image is a beautiful monochrome; the odds insurmountable. Nonetheless, Manji (Takuya Kimura), our hero, enters the fray filled with reckless vengeance. The ensuing ultraviolence is equal parts intense and ludicrous, combining the climatic combat of Kobayashi’s Samurai Rebellion with Kill Bill’s battle in the House of Blue Leaves. If proceedings so far leave a viewer incredulous, or seeking something of more substance, the opening credits to follow might as well be the closing. But for those who could imagine little better than this spectacle of bloody samurai action, there is much to look forward to.

The titles soon appear, now in blood-splattered colour. This is Blade of the Immortal, Taskashi Miike’s 100^th film over a 26 year career. His astonishing productivity, of course, has led to a marked contrast in quality for some of his work, from the depths of the ridiculous to the heights of the sublime, and sometimes both at once. Blade of the Immortal, while uneven, happily finds itself on the better end of the spectrum, and offers the exact kind of feudal ferocity one might hope for. This isn’t the first time Miike has strayed into samurai territory, with his recent remakes of Kudo’s 13 Assassins and Kobayashi’s Hara-Kiri stamping his mark on the genre. However, this venture has less in common in those original films of the 60s than it does with a later series of samurai films –Lone Wolf and Cub (perhaps better known in its truncated US edition as Shogun Assassin). Like Lone Wolf, Blade of the Immortal is adapted from a manga, they also both shrug off any sense of history for supernatural and anachronistic elements of plot and design. The feudal setting is more a blank canvas than a reality the stories might inhabit. In Lone Wolf this can be seen in the finale of its sixth entry, featuring skiing samurai (a sight to behold), while Blade of the Immortal is not short on platinum blonde hair or any amount of fictional (referred to in the film as ‘foreign’) weaponry.

The central conceit, however ridiculous, could easily have existed within a more ‘authentic’ world, but that would be missing the point. That conceit is essentially spelt out in the title – after his initial battle Manji is all but slain, yet before death a mystic curses him with immortality. This takes physical form as ‘bloodworms’, which heal any wound he might sustain. The story itself takes place some years after this, with the young daughter of a sensei at a particular dojo finding herself orphaned by the plight of a nefarious warrior, Anotsu (Sôta Fukushi). This outcast plans to destroy all the separate schools of martial arts so as to coalesce them into one, under him. His exact reasoning for this is somewhat vague, his main motivation being a general rejection of specific martial forms after his father was reprimanded for fighting ‘improperly’ while a student of one. Perhaps not compelling enough an argument to undertake a mission of mass murder, but this is not a film of complex reasoning. In fact its one real theme of any depth, that of vengeance, is itself a little murky. It is often made clear how many people must suffer and die for the sake of, often needless, revenge – in fact it is for this reason Manji is first cursed with immortality. Despite this, the film still revels in it, and does not offer any sort of redemption arc for the characters in that regard. It wouldn’t be unlike Miike for this to be some kind of meta-narrative targeted at the audience – this is ultimately what we want to see, and what we enjoy seeing, despite its immorality – but it still makes for a less-than-compelling thematic basis for the film.

The young daughter, Rin (Hana Sugisaki), seeks out Manji on the word of the very mystic who first cursed him. First encapsulating the reluctant hero trope, Manji eventually agrees to help Rin, and so just like Lone Wolf a man and a child find themselves on ‘The Road to Hell’ – a journey of vengeance. Yet unlike Lone Wolf, where Itto is consistently surprising in his incredible ability, Manji is not quite the swordsman he once was. In fact, in almost all of his armed encounters he is first defeated, only achieving ultimate victory through his being deathless. This is sometimes entertaining, as in a moment where he severs his own arm to free himself from a trap, but the low stakes do strip the film of some drama in earlier scenes. This isn’t a film to be taken seriously, Miike is well aware of this, but jeopardy is still necessary in some sense. Luckily the film introduces a predictable but welcome beat, a poison that weakens his bloodworms, threatening his immortality. This also introduces a moral problem – his wish for restful death against his obligation to his new ward. It isn’t explored in much detail, but allows some smouldering tension.

Less smouldering is the action, which instead periodically sets the film alight. Unlike some western-style samurai films, emulating many of their influences by backloading the action after a slow simmering build, Blade of the Immortal offers consistent conflict across its runlength. Its set pieces are engaging and impressively captured; its body count would make John Wick wince. None quite match the incredible opening, but some come close enough. There is also a lack of the terrible CGI that has haunted many modern Japanese films, including some of Miike’s own. A similar film crippled by this was Takeshi Kitano’s Zatoichi, with its awful effects sinking what is otherwise a solid comedy-action samurai flick, not so unlike Blade of the Immortal in tone. There are still some questionable moments, such as a computer-generated gravestone (a true mystery of cinema); but otherwise it isn’t distracting, especially and essentially regarding the (vast quantities of) blood.

As the film progresses various subplots and secondary characters appear, but most are not developed adequately. The reason for this is likely the source material – in adapting the extensive first arc of the manga screenwriter Tesuya Oishi had to maintain as many elements of the story as could fit in 150 minutes without disappointing its core audience, or indeed alienating newcomers. As such some inclusions appear more to be references than essential elements of the film, and fall by the wayside when the main drive of the narrative returns. This might also explain the underdeveloped themes – Hiroaki Samura’s original writing was praised for its sympathetic antagonists, especially in Anotsu. In the film this is hinted at, but is not built enough to ever take effect, though its tone perhaps suits this less ambiguous presentation. But ultimately this isn’t essential – Miike has created a piece of entertainment that overcomes these narrative shortcomings through sheer energy and visual flair. It’s exactly what one might expect from a film called Blade of the Immortal, and there’s little more that could be asked than that.

7/10

Blade of the Immortal had its UK premiere on the 8th of October at London Film Festival. Check out the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner looks at Samuel Maoz’s three part drama, denounced by Israel’s Minister of Culture.

Written and directed by Samuel Maoz, Foxtrot is a political film. Set in Tel Aviv, it tells the story of an Israeli soldier and his family, and naturally encompasses much of the controversy burning in that part of the world. But it is not a film of heroes and villains, nor one that seeks to frame the Israel-Palestine conflict in any wider context. Foxtrot is an introspective film: an inward look at Israel’s involvement in the West Bank through the eyes of one family. The head of this family is Michael Feldmann (Lior Ashkenazi), a veteran and stern authority figure. As the film opens he receives the worst of news – his son, Jonathan (Yonathan Shiray), has been killed in action. An oppressive and disorientating tone is quickly assumed, an overhead camera canting around as Michael walks across a room. Soldiers tell him to drink every hour, and he sets an alarm on his phone to do so. This serves as an interesting dramatic device, both informing the audience of time passed, and creating a momentary break (or escalation) in tension every so often. Michael is bewildered, but due to the stringent rules surrounding burial in Jewish culture there is little time to spare – he must inform his family and organise a funeral with the military within the day.

It is here that Foxtrot first veers away from what might appear to be a straight character study around loss and despair. A military rabbi visits the house and, in a scene bordering on satire, goes through the funeral procedure with clinical precision and diligent brevity. He suggests Michael could help carry his son’s coffin, but doesn’t recommend it. These funerals are so common, it would seem, that for the rabbi it is a rote task, losing both its ostensive religious meaning and any requirement for basic sympathy. While there is a swing back to the despondent tone soon after, the secret’s out – Foxtrot is not to remain the overtly serious film it began (very effectively) as, but will instead dance the line between comedy and tragedy. As this first act comes to a close Michael is told his son is in fact not dead, but that another Jonathon Feldmann had met that fate. Relief and irrationality sweep him as he demands his son return, hoping to get him home and safe, even though he isn’t necessarily at any particular risk.

Cut to that particular risk – two soldiers at an otherwise deserted outpost, totally bored. They talk for a while, and the subject turns to the eponymous dance. Then in the film’s best scene, Jonathon provides an example, breaking into brilliant dance, his rifle as partner. Far from the film that had Michael scold his hand to try and put off the horrific reality of loss, this second act is about youth and boredom, camaraderie and routine. The four soldiers stationed at this post, all young and stultified, pass the time in their way – one tinkers with equipment; one is constantly listening to loud music; Jonathon sketches. As time goes by they encounter occasional travellers at the outpost. The first they let by fairly simply – a check of their details and off they go – but with each group that passes a creeping sense of unease deepens. This is matched by the container in which the soldiers sleep, which is literally sinking into the ground. The ultimate effect is to paint a sense of innocence across the soldiers (a particular shot of them playfighting to Mahler is the best example of this) without absolving them of wrongdoing. A situation is displayed in which men who are not evil might commit evil acts. It is the system of the outposts really being indicted here: the way in which they make necessary the demeaning of Palestinian commuters to support a wider system of repression.

The tone of the film expertly reflects this darkening progression; palpable strain builds with each vehicle to pass the checkpoint. While the soldiers themselves remain much the same – bored, a little tetchy – the circumstances vary. At one point an innocent couple are made to leave their car in torrential rain; at another, after an extended segment of serious tension, a can falls out of a car. It looks to be a grenade; a soldier, not yet twenty, opens fire. Maoz has created sympathetic characters and does not wish to create antagonists in these men, so making that moment of gunfire doubly nauseating – the gunman was not malignant, but his actions are unforgivable. Or at least they should be; following this climax the brass effectively sweep the incident under the rug. As with the rabbi’s routine attitude towards funerals in the first act, this incident is no rare thing, and life goes on.

Just as the film returns to the crushing tenor it opened with, Maoz again decides to inject it again with levity. Using the illustrations in Jonathon’s notebook, the pictures come alive in a fully, and wonderfully, animated section that effectively traces his father’s past – from trading his mother’s precious bible for an erotic mag to his exploits in war. Despite the overt humour in this section, the key theme is one of guilt, first from his original sin in giving away a family heirloom, but sustained beyond this. This passes to Jonathon – the cycle continues. As is spelled out toward the end of the film, the foxtrot is endless, going round and round: forward; left; back; right. So might be this conflict Israel finds itself caught up in unless something is done. This is another example of Maoz’ subtle yet impactful approach to the problem, doing away with flags, borders, and mass destruction for a more intimate examination of a crisis. The brilliant camerawork and committed performances grant this story engaging life – the emphasis on top-down angles being particularly novel – but it is in the writing that it truly excels. For a conflict so often defined by extremes, Foxtrot manages to marry sympathy and criticism just as well as it does tragedy and comedy. That is to say, very.

8/10

Foxtrot has its UK premiere on October 11th, at London Film Festival. Check out the trailer below.

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the BFI’s 61st London Film Festival (4-15 October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner considers Andrey Zvyagintsev’s painful family drama.

Loveless opens, much like Andrey Zvyagintsev’s last film – Leviathan – with a montage of wordless images. We are presented with beautiful winter trees, glistening under a cold sun, to the sound of Evgueni and Sacha Galperine’s disquieting soundtrack. Following this a longshot captures the end of a school day in Moscow and children making their way home. The camera follows one child in particular, Alexey (Matvey Novikov), tracking his movements via Zvyagintsev’s typical gliding motion. His route home is indirect, leading him to the snow-covered woods of the film’s beginning. Why this might be becomes soon apparent on his return home – his parents, Zhenya (Maryana Spivak) and Boris (Aleksey Rozin), are in the final stages of a breakup of no small acrimony. One scene highlights this, in which the two viciously harangue one another on the fate of their son, as he listens on secretly from the bathroom. The slow pan that reveals Alexey sobbing silently is one of the film’s most quietly devastating moments, and it isn’t short on those.

The main narrative takes hold after this introduction, with the sudden, if not inexplicable, disappearance of Alexey. The disappearance of children is not new for Zvyagintsev, with The Return presenting the phenomena from an inversed perspective, and Leviathan including it as a brief plot beat. But here it takes centre-stage as far as the narrative is concerned. Rather than presenting a parental reunion, however temporary, to pool resources and find their child, Zvyagintsev instead uses this heightened tension to expose the full tragedy of Boris and Zhenya’s relationship. In fact, finding the child, while carrying some dramatic heft, is not particularly important to the film’s purpose. Both Boris and Zhenya are in separate relationships – importantly it is unclear who first betrayed who – Boris with a young women he has already managed to impregnate, Zhenya with an older man of no small wealth. For Boris a divorce is deeply worrying, as his boss is heavily Christian and such an action might lead him to be fired. Zhenya worries about having to take care of the son she believes despises her. The film’s 2012 setting also lends a mildly apocalyptic tone, with mention of the doomsday theories of that time cropping up on the radio. The world at large may not end, but the world known to Boris and Zhenya surely will.

As soon as Alexey disappears, Zvyagintsev takes aim at a target he formerly took to task in Leviathan – the Russian authorities. The police are called shortly after Zhenya realizes her son is missing, and the officer tells her it’s probably a runaway, and so they won’t do anything (until, of course, it’s probably too late). Yet for those who accused Zvyagintsev for being ‘anti-Russian’ in his last film, that Zhenya must instead rely on a civilian group devoted to finding missing children surely contradicts this sentiment. It isn’t the Russian people he has issue with, though his films might often be populated by cruel Russians, but the larger structures, social or political, they find themselves part of. If anything, Loveless characterizes the Russian saying Nadezhda emirate posledney: hope dies last. That Zvyagintsev is keen on elucidating that final knell gives the film its tragic power, though even then the final shot invites a number of divergent interpretations on that note.

Through their rancorous alliance to try and discover their son, the silently-acknowledged seams in Boris and Zhenya’s become gaping chasms. The tension between them builds excellently as they’re forced to cooperate despite one another. We reach an initial climax in their visit to Zhenya’s mother, so-called by Boris ‘Stalin-in-a-skirt’ (a solid idiom). She reveals loudly she never approved of the pairing of Boris and Zhenya, and that keeping Alexey was a mistake. This argument continues between Boris and Zhenya as they drive home, Zhenya exclaiming that she should have had an abortion and that Boris had ‘ruined her life.’ It’s a moment of extremity, and one admirably responded to by Rozin, whose performance is especially good as his often-meek and reserved character is pushed into open conflict. But it is in Zhenya’s character that the more interesting complexity lies, as her loud and aggressive front clearly does not portray her true feelings all of the time. Her utter rejection of Alexey seems based on her own insecurities, and in a later, truly heart-rending scene she admits that she would never have left him – a truth hiding only a little under the surface. Zvyagintsev leaves subtle clues to this effect throughout the film’s length, granting that climatic moment its potency. But her character’s outstanding pain, that she has lost the best years of her life to a loveless existence, is a feeling not easily shaken. Nor is the sadness of Boris, a small man but not an evil one, easily cast aside. Zvyagintsev has crafted characters who are often unpleasant, but rarely unreal.

Besides these strong central themes some others don’t land so heavily. One concerns the use of social media. Several shots are devoted to selfie-culture, and the ever-happy lives we present online. The actual purpose of this sub-theme is less clear, however, with a possible explanation being to create a sense of two spheres, the real and the online. This would feed into Alexey’s narrative, as he spent most of his time online, beyond the detection of his parents, and his doings were largely unknown to them. Just as Boris’ new girlfriend presents a smiling version of herself and her mother online moments after an argument, there was perhaps a different Alexey too. But this is not explored in any depth and could easily be a thin and disposable critique on phone obsession. Another area of the film that felt out of place was its political subtext, whose nuances I, admittedly, do not have much understanding of. It can be detected only in hints, with a radio broadcast first mentioning Kremlin corruption before subtly tagging on a news report of how Jill Stein was barred from electoral debates in the USA – we’re all as bad as each other, right? The epilogue of the film jumps some years later and we hear snippets of a television show talking about war in the Donbass, following on from other mentions of Ukraine throughout. While the director has claimed there is no political message in Loveless, he has also admitted that the comparison of the quarrelling couple to the situation in Ukraine was ‘absolutely obvious’ and that he ‘could not help but use it.’ Happily these comparisons are not too heavily laboured and certainly don’t make up the core of the film, but their necessity is questionable.

What isn’t questionable, however, is the technical brilliance on show. Much like in his former films, Zvyagintsev utilizes a gliding camera that constantly reframes images, otherwise holding for particularly long shots. This presents a sense of intimacy, and coupled with the beautiful composition and cold lighting, an immersion into each frame. But it is in the script and performances that Loveless comes to life, an examination of people pushed to their limits during an inescapable tragedy.

8/10

Loveless will have its UK premiere at London Film Festival on the 8th of October. From November10th, it will be available nation-wide. Check out the trailer below:

Milo Garner concludes his review series of Lynch’s Twin Peaks revival.

WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS.

Finally, after nearly sixteen hours of television, Twin Peaks comes to an end in its final two parts. Part 17 is in many ways as clear an ending as one might expect from David Lynch – which is to say, not clear at all, but there is a closure offered. A variety of contrived events lead most of our primary characters to the Twin Peaks Sheriff’s Department, with Bob Coop being shot in the back – though it isn’t the first time he’s taken a bullet in this series. The real Cooper (yes, real! It’s still difficult to believe) later arrives at the scene, and witnesses – as Bob emerges from Bob Coop’s corpse – a sort of orb that might better suit a sci-fi channel TV movie (sorry not sorry). Freddie, the man with the gardening glove, finds his destiny come upon him, and engages in a bizarre punching contest with this evil orb, eventually destroying it. Could that be it? The primeval doom haunting the denizens of Twin Peaks – and far beyond – dealt with by a tertiary character’s magic hand? Of course not.

Following this Coop is approached by Naido, whose face peels back and shows her to be none other than Diane. A giant superimposition of Cooper’s face overlays the screen for the rest of the scene – as he says ‘we live inside a dream.’ The effect is bizarre, but it works – this episode does have the tinge of a dream ever-deepening. The narrative seems to agree, leading the gang to the Great Northern, wherein Coop follows the sound that has haunted Ben for most of the series. He meets Mike, chanting the ‘fire walk with me’ lines, before being led again to Jeffries in the monochrome convenience store. He is told to find Judy, and the mysterious symbol of the Owl Cave becomes an 8 (or is it ∞?). Then, cutting together new footage with scenes from Fire Walk With Me, Lynch inserts Cooper into the past: the night of Laura’s murder. Laura recognizes Cooper from a dream, and she is led by him away – she is ‘going home’. Her body disappears from its position in the very first episode of Twin Peaks, Back to the Future style. Everything seems to have changed – Coop has undone it all. If this was the very final episode one might be forgiven for assuming genuine, unbelievable, closure. But there are a few more scenes to come – Sarah Palmer smashes the homecoming picture of Laura, so essential to the Twin Peaks aesthetic; Laura disappears in the woods; we hear that scream once again. Then the episode plays out, with Julee Cruise predictably, but perfectly, reprising her role as a Roadhouse musician. Even with the mysterious ending, it’s difficult to imagine a full part more to come.

If Part 17 was the ending for traditional Twin Peaks, 18 is the ending to the more Lynchian Twin Peaks that rears its surreal head every few episodes. We see again Cooper leading Laura through the woods, and again her disappearance. Then Coop is back in the Red Room, and Laura whispers in his ear before she is lifted through the ceiling. Coop leaves and finds Diane, hair as red as the room he came from, awaiting him. They drive through a portal far way and reach a motel, then have sex to the sound of ‘My Prayer’ by The Platters, last heard in Part 8’s 50s section. When he awakens everything has changed – a note is left addressed to Richard from Linda. We can assume that in whatever world he has woken up to, he is no longer Agent Dale Cooper, but Richard. Here we go again. The motel he leaves and the car he enters are different to those of the night before, and he drives to a coffee shop called Eat at Judy’s, hinting at Jeffries’ comment in Part 17. He asks if another waitress works there – she does, but it’s her day off. He finds out where she lives and discovers her to be Laura, or rather, her doppelganger. This woman is actually Carrie, but at Coop’s insistence she allows him to ferry her to Laura’s home in Twin Peaks. On the journey Lynch focuses on an image that has always fascinated him, the dark American highway partially lit by headlights passing at speed. There is an inherent fear to the vast emptiness of these long American roads, and Lynch won’t let us forget it. It reminds us of Lost Highway specifically. That comparison can be taken further: not only was that a film that focused heavily on doppelgangers, but it also included a narrative that changed its characters and locations mid-way through, much like Coop’s situation in this episode. Eventually arriving at Twin Peaks, Coop arrives at Sarah’s house to find it occupied by someone else. Upon asking who the new occupant bought it from Coop discovers no trace of Sarah Palmer whatsoever. In his bemusement he ponders what year it is, Carrie hears the voice of Sarah shout ‘Laura’, and Carrie screams that scream. And so it ends.

If there was a fear Lynch was posing too many questions in the last few episodes of Twin Peaks to ever be answered, this is the response to that fear, an episode that essentially turns the entire series on its head. There have been many attempts to interpret Part 18, including the suggestion that it and Part 17 might better be played overlayed on top of each other, but many of its mysteries will doubtlessly go unsolved. But is this a bad ending to Twin Peaks? No – in fact, it might well be the perfect ending for Twin Peaks. It surrenders any suggestion of rounding the story off, as implied in Part 17, and remains compelling throughout, allowing a sense of surprise and unknowing even this late in the game. As the series finally finishes, very possibly for good, the superlative quality of what has come before makes it hard to feel disappointed. Across 18 Parts Lynch has not only revived Twin Peaks, but improved it, crafting some of the most interesting and original television of recent times.

Twin Peaks: The Revival has concluded. It aired Mondays at 2am in simulcast with the U.S. on Sky Atlantic, and again at 9pm on Tuesdays.

Milo Garner examines Aronofsky’s complex psychological horror.

WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS.

The best to be said of mother! is that it’s ambitious. One of the most madcap and original studio films of recent times, it’s genuinely staggering to consider that Paramount execs leafed through mother!’s script and decided to fund the thing. Much of this decision might well have been based on lead Jennifer Lawrence’s star power. Writer-director Darren Aronofsky’s reputation is also likely to have helped: while his track record is by no means perfect, he has at least one great film behind him and a fair few good ones. Even in some of his misfires, such as Noah – a film which had more in common with a Transformers flick than the powerful biblical epic it was trying to be – there is quality to be found. Though mother! is (mostly) a chamber piece restricted to a single location, there are commonalities between it and Noah, particularly in its religious and environmental themes. Only mother! is much, much worse.

The ostensible plot of mother! is of a poet and his housewife living together in a house far from civilisation, the first hoping for some inspiration while the second decorates. They are come upon by various unwelcome visitors, whose disruptive and continued presence cause Lawrence’s housewife deep stress. Events spiral out of control as the poet’s fame revives, and their home becomes a chaotic Gomorrah torn apart by his rabid followers. There is little actual plot in the film, and the characters too are rather thin, but this is because they aren’t characters. Aronofsky and co. have been upfront in describing the film as an allegory, but that much would be obvious from the credits alone: Lawrence is mother, and Javier Bardem, her poet husband, is Him. The two initial visitors are man and woman. Their children are oldest son and younger brother. Further supporting cast are credited with such pretensions as herald, cupbearer, and zealot.

Their roles are similarly obvious, as is the general thrust of the film, regardless of how incoherent it attempts to be (assuming that is intentional). Lawrence is Mother Earth, with the home representing her domain, and Bardem is God, who loves and creates, though he prioritizes the whims of men to his first love, the world. In result Bardem appears personable but ignorant of his wife, while she takes on the appearance of a precious victim. She is frequently ignored and squirms as her housework is undone. This leads to the unfortunate image of a woman being married to her house, a powerless Madonna who cannot (and perhaps, should not) leave her domestic sphere. I don’t feel Aronofsky meant to push a regressive ideal of womanhood with this film, but I suppose that’s what you get when you mess with Abrahamic imagery. The home is soon visited by Ed Harris’s Man, or Adam. His presence is already one of mild corruption, as he smokes and drinks in the house – Mother is visibly repulsed by both activities.

God, however, welcomes him and is intrigued by his ways, welcoming too Michelle Pfeiffer’s Woman, Eve, into his home the following day. Mother is upset that God has again ignored her for his own whim, and to her diminishment. Eve is sultry and drunken, introducing yet more sin into the home, and – more than Adam – seeking the forbidden sections of the property. Aronofsky doesn’t quite have them desire a certain fruit, but the enigmatic stone that sits in God’s study fits the slot. They eventually steal into the study together, and predictably end up breaking the stone. God is outraged, and seals the study shut. Never again will Adam and Eve return to that place; but, despite Mother’s pleading, they will also not leave the house. Then, in one of the film’s most ridiculous interludes, Adam and Eve’s children arrive complaining of some inequality in Adam’s will. The older son, who we will call Cain, scuffles with his younger brother, who we will call Abel, killing him with a doorknob. Then the LORD put a mark on Cain (Genesis 4:15) as he attempts to restrain him. At least with Adam and Eve the older actors and blurred morality created some ambiguity – this scene is instead so blatant and obvious that it undermines anything Aronofsky had built to this point. But it’s only downhill from here.

God invites back Adam and Eve, with their friends and family in tow, to mourn to the loss of Abel. Unlike the God of the Bible, and the God suggested in much of Noah, mother!’s God is not particularly vengeful and prefers forgiveness – a Christian tinge on Aronofsky’s typically Jewish angle, perhaps. Mother is naturally, yet quietly, outraged at this group invitation, as once again she hasn’t been consulted. The mourners multiply and eventually the event becomes a sort of party, with smoking, alcohol, and sex – oh, the horror! (It is interesting to note that sex and sexuality are treated with some revulsion throughout, for whatever reason.) Mother can hardly contain herself as her home undergoes minimal damage.

It is here one of the film’s few positives can be mentioned: as a technical feat it is very effective. Its close camera and emphasised sound effects create a true sense of claustrophobia and discomfort. The camera spends at least half of the film close on, or behind, Mother in a manner reflecting the style (if not the direct effect) seen in Son of Saul. Some of the extreme close-ups are less successful, but happily infrequent. The sounds of peripheral and background items are also exaggerated to further this sense of unease – the low buzz of a lightbulb might become deafening as Mother passes. Though not a typical horror film, these aspects can be praised in reference to that genre – the atmosphere is efficacious and few of the unnerving moments seem overly forced, at least in the first two thirds.

Much of this effectiveness is lost in regarding the context of the horror, however. Some comparison has been offered to Luis Buñuel, who might be the master of depicting the collapse of a bourgeois home, but where he uses religious imagery in mockery (think the replication of the Last Supper in Viridiana) Aronofsky is being totally earnest. Where he mocked the plight of the prissy bourgeois, as in The Exterminating Angel, Aronofsky hopes that we sympathise as a wealthy woman must share her home with the less fortunate for a while. But perhaps this could be explained by the psychological profile of Mother herself. After all, one of mother!’s posters directly references Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, a complex portrait of a mother-to-be if there ever was one. But as referenced above, Mother is barely a character in her own right, just a stand-in for a concept. There is no direct explanation for her psychosis offered, nor is one apparently necessary – that Mother is the earth being desecrated by the mindless followers of God is enough for Aronofsky.

After the folly of man causes a flood in the house (no ark in sight) the visitors scamper and calm returns to the home, giving God the opportunity to impregnate Mother. Through this, and his experiences with Adam and Eve’s people, he is inspired, and finds himself able to write poetry again. He eventually publishes the resulting work, again without consulting Mother, and the people are enamoured with his new verse. Mother, now heavily pregnant, prepares a meal for the two, but is perturbed as some of God’s fans appear at the door. He responds to their love with love of his own, and a throng begins to appear, growing ever larger and larger. They eventually pour into the house itself, God explaining that any damage done to the home can be replaced, that he can and should be kind to his followers. This is an interesting portrait of the creator – is he being presented as a sort of egomaniac who needs the attention, or someone so filled with love for his creations that he must return it, regardless of the consequences? Whichever way, Aronofsky is delivering a flawed version of the almighty, though it isn’t clear what the message inherent in this is.

At this point the film welcomes absolute chaos to the mix. What begins as a rowdy party quickly devolves into a semi-apocalyptic warzone, with armed police battling against people in various rooms of the house; Kirstin Wiig makes an appearance as God’s publisher (the Herald) and is eventually seen summarily executing prisoners twice at once, a gun in each hand (as ridiculous as it sounds). The military appears, bombs fall. All the while we are subjected to Jennifer Lawrence wailing and running through the turmoil, which isn’t particularly pleasant. Her performance is committed, but the writing, and presumably direction, lack the necessary nuance to shape her energy. Up to this point the film had a deliberate pace, and some mystery to it, despite the obvious biblical references. Here it becomes loud, blunt, and nigh unintelligible. Aronofsky apologized to the audience of the Toronto International Film Festival while introducing the film, saying ‘sorry for what I am about to do to you.’ I feel it’s an apology we all deserve. He likely meant this as he feels the film is ‘a cruise missile shooting into a wall’, in that it is powerful, shocking, effective. He’s right, in a way, but more that it is painful, irresponsible, and ultimately unpleasant for all near enough to experience it. This isn’t a masterpiece of shock horror I can’t handle, but a near-laughable attempt to communicate his ham-fisted message with whatever terrible images he could conjure.

But, what is this message? The general swing to the film is ‘don’t damage the environment,’ but does this allegory really go further than that? Does the inclusion of Biblical stories actually emphasise this concept at all? Consider the film’s finale in disgusting bravado, wherein Mother’s child (who might or might not be called Jesus) is passed to the people of God and killed in their clamouring. They end up eating its flesh (this might be a mockery of the Christian practices around Jesus’ body – it’s hard to pin down Aronofsky’s opinions on religion) and Mother destroys the house and herself, only for God to restart the process for another attempt. What is the audience supposed to take away from this allegory? The obvious is that if we don’t stop destroying the earth we’ll find ourselves in some sort of apocalypse, but then the film is so non-specific about the destruction of the earth itself that it is rendered impotent. Does it mean for us to not drink or smoke, that general hedonism (including sex for reasons other than copulation) should be shunned? That religious fanaticism is dangerous to the world? Potentially, but again the actual point of it all is illusive – by its final third mother! simply becomes a kind of allegorical torture porn without any proper resolution. Films shouldn’t find themselves forced into resolutions and obvious messages, of course, but when the body of the work is so painfully overt otherwise, the payoff needs to justify itself. But is Aronofsky not the same man who directed The Wrestler, a film that proves him a man of quality? I say unto him – those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent (Revelation 3:19).

2/10

mother! is out now in UK cinemas. Check out the trailer below.

Milo Garner reviews Andy Muschietti’s adaptation of Stephen King’s novel of the same name.

The echoed singing of a nursery rhyme is a troubling opening to any horror film. If one were to guess the content of the following feature based on that first impression, the assumption would be a predictable, forced, and generic attempt at cheap scares. The next 135 minutes of It go on, unfortunately, to confirm these fears. That probably wasn’t the kind of fright Warner Brothers were counting on.

It, an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Stephen King, is a flat, cliché-ridden attempt to jump on the ‘Retro 80s‘ zeitgeist of recent times. Set in 1988-9, it centres on Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård), an evil and otherworldly clown who haunts the young denizens of Derry every twenty-seven years. The films open with its best sequence: a child following his paper boat down a rainy kerb as it falls down a drain. Peering into the dark, he encounters Pennywise; they talk for a while, creating an extended moment of suspense which concludes in a moment of shocking violence (and the film’s only effective scare).

Even in this scene, some of the elements that will come to haunt It are apparent. Central to these is Pennywise himself. His voice is a little too growly to be unnerving in a clowny sense, yet too wacky to be purely intimidating. His general design also feels a little too exuberant – the often-furrowed brow, drifting eyes, and well-groomed hair are over-egging what might be a scary image. The design of Pennywise in the 1990s miniseries, while also flawed, was far more effective in its simplicity and, ironically, cheapness. The trouble with Pennywise only grows as the film moves along – in this early scene he has an unnerving presence, with a sinister yet reticent intention for his young prey, but in later scenes these attempts to build tension are dropped entirely. Pennywise is witnessed incredibly often as a speeding demon, rushing teeth-first to his quarry. Limiting the visual presence of the monster in a horror film can often increase its effectiveness when they do appear, as what we imagine in the shadows is undoubtedly worse than the real thing, but It gives us no such chance. This is also felt with various of the other supernatural villains featured in the film. An eldritch surrealist picture comes to life, for example, but quickly moves from the shadows to reveal a fang-filled grin, missing the point about what made such an unusual image so discomforting. Another moment features a zombie-like leper, whose features belong more in Scooby Doo: Monsters Unleashed (specifically) than any genuine horror – in fact, most of the post-production and effects in It are severely lacking.

This merely ties into a far more worrying problem with It’s horror. It simply isn’t scary. At all. This is partly based on what kind of horror it’s trying to be – some horror goes for an atmosphere of dread (think Vampyr), others try to get into the viewers’ head (The VVitch), while this is of the kind that attempts to get as many scares in as possible. That’s not inherently bad, but it does mean the scares have to be good, especially when the film has a strong enough comedic counterpoint to essentially destroy a sustained feeling of unease (more on that later). Unfortunately, It relies on the fairly basic jump-scare for the vast majority of its fear-factor, often forgoing the build-up such a payoff typically demands. These are, more often than not, dominated not by the visuals of the film but by the soundtrack. Overbearing audio cues, in the score and the soundtrack otherwise, seek to jolt us with sudden changes as soon as anything sudden happens. The film overplays its hand here, even trying to make innocuous knocks and bangs shocking moments by simply making them really loud. It isn’t the content that’s making us jump, just the volume. This isn’t to say auditory horror is to be discarded, only that in this lazy application it fails to amount to much. Consider Black Swan in comparison – many of its unnerving moments are deeply augmented by Clint Mansell’s sharp interventions on the soundtrack, but it never feels overdone or inauthentic. In It, the opposite is true.

Other than the inherently ineffectual horror, It doesn’t help itself through its general tone. Outside of its many set pieces, the film transforms into a Goonies-like high school comedy, with foul-mouthed wise-cracking archetypes riffing off each other to the sound of 80s hits. The gang’s all here: the dutiful leader, the nervy Jewish kid, the germaphobe, the fat funny one and smart glasses one (wait, switch those descriptions to change it up a little), the cool and quirky girl who doesn’t really belong in the group, and one who’s black (that being his only notable feature in a film that decides not to actually give him much of a character, despite his importance in the novel). Not to mention some of the clichés they dutifully fulfil, such as the shot of the love interest wreathed in golden light matched by a reverse of our protagonist, slack-jawed as the camera pushes in; the best pals having a scuffle at the climax of the second act followed by a montage of them living their separate lives; even True Love’s Kiss makes a bizarre appearance for some reason. To It’s credit, the child-acting (and so, necessarily, their director) is excellent in a way unusual of Hollywood films, though it does suffer from the common trope of kids not acting much like kids, but little adults. But that’s hardly uncommon, especially in the genre. The characters, while obvious templates as shown above, do work fairly well and are generally likable, most having small arcs to fulfil and progressing a little from titles to credits. They also don’t belong in this film – a John Hughes flick on high school maybe, but this many ‘your mom’ jokes in a film that genuinely wants to scare its audience? Maybe that itself is the horror. While the comedy is decent (not that funny, but also not as obnoxious as it could have been), it compromises any sense of dread that It might have hoped to build between set pieces, especially when it becomes ridiculous, such as a moment where the Losers’ Club fights a group of bullies in a ‘rock fight!’ (as one of the kids declares) to the sound of 80s punk. The leader of said bullies is another of the film’s ridiculous features. Bullies do bad stuff, sure, but carving his name into a kid with a knife? That can’t be taken half as seriously as the film would like us to.

This clearly isn’t a film for seriousness, nor would it have to be. But it does try, for whatever reason, to shoehorn some in, such as a subplot about an incestuous rapist father which felt far more out of place than any of the low-brow comedy. Under the thematic basis of It, genuine real-life fear always triggers the appearance of Pennywise’s red balloon, and so his terrible psychological torment; but the film’s approach is muddle. The abovementioned father has far better potential to be scary than the blood-spurting sink the film decides to follow up one of his appearances with, for one.

The general plot beyond this theme is fairly uninteresting. A hackneyed ancient-haunting trope plays out, with the gang needing to go to the position of an old well now built within a haunted house at the edge of town. It’s entirely predictable, and the character development follows a formulaic three-act structure impossible not to second-guess. This plot only really exists to facilitate the meat of It, which is in scaring its audience, but given it fails there the whole thing falls flat. Not only that, but it’s a film that overstays its welcome – the first two acts go by fairly quickly, but the third begins to drag, with a very messy finale. Before the screening we were told the two hours fifteen would go by like eighty minutes. This is far from the case. With that said, It does save its biggest scare for the very last moment. After the screen has gone dark we see the film’s true title – It: Chapter One. May we all be spared.

3/10

It is out now in UK cinemas. Trailer below.

Milo Garner reviews the sixteenth chapter of Lynch’s revival series.

WARNING: This review contains spoilers.

‘I am the FBI.’

We have waited a long time for these words. I don’t mean a long time since the original series, which aired before my own birth, nor even from the build-up to this new series, with its slow trickle of trailers and set photos. Within the series itself, in these first 16 parts, the Twin Peaks audience has been collectively holding its breath for this moment. At first it seemed inevitable; that it would maybe come a few episodes in. Then it started to seem like a mid-series twist. Then, perhaps, something that might never happen. The Lynch who brought back ‘Just You’ could easily have deprived his audience of something they actually wanted – it would be almost typical. But, in this penultimate episode, we have been granted our innermost desire, allowing this this sole moment almost to overshadow one of Twin Peaks’ otherwise finest episodes.

I am, of course, referring to the words spoken by Coop, moments after his return. Not Bob Coop, or Dougie Coop – this is special agent Dale Cooper, back as he was all those years ago. Kyle MacLachlan effortlessly slips back into the character (marking the third persona he has portrayed in this series), bringing his charm, cheerful demeanour, and supportive yet dutiful attitude immediately to the fore. As he awakens from a coma induced by an electric shock last week (electricity has been a recurring theme in the revival), Badalamenti’s classic soundtrack emerges and takes us all back, closing what could be the longest slow burn in television. The remainder of the episode gives us precious little time with the man himself; we see only his departure from Dougie’s family to catch a flight to Twin Peaks. But it’s enough, for now. Hopefully the final two hours will give us all the time we need.

Besides this, however, an excellent episode exists, and some storylines are actually tied up(!) The first of these is Richard Horne’s, who appears to be the son of Bob Coop, and finds himself dead by a trap meant for his father. This isn’t a plotline that really went anywhere, but at least there’s some closure. Another plotline for which progress seems alien is the double-team of Chantal and Mitch, who are seen often despite their lack of activity. They await Dougie at his home, hoping to kill him, though for them it is already too late. A neighbour approaches them and tells them to get out of his driveway, which they are partially blocking – they refuse and he rams them with his car. This triggers a ridiculous gunfight which finds Chantal and Mitch dead, riddled with bullets, in what might be the least-predictable action scene of the entire series. The Mitchum brothers look on. ‘People are under a lot of stress, Bradley,’ says Rodney.

Elsewhere, Diane’s story also seems to conclude, with Bob Coop inducing her to attempt to kill her FBI colleagues. It isn’t so simple as that – Diane is clearly resisting this inner urge in a great scene of tension and insecurity. As it turns out, Diane herself was but another double, and when she is shot she returns to the Red Room, leaving there another seed. But the best non-Coop-related scene is yet to come. Towards the end of the episode comes Audrey, with her story finally moving forwards. Now she is at the Roadhouse, though perhaps not the Roadhouse we know. It is announced that ‘Audrey’s Dance’, a track from the original Twin Peaks soundtrack, will be played by the band. Sure enough, they play that very tune, and suitably Audrey has a lonesome dance in the middle of the abandoned dance floor, with a crowd looking in from a distance. A beautifully surreal moment, this is another moment of payoff after some weeks of frustrating build-up. This scene also confirms a theory some had about Audrey’s current state, as at its conclusion she appears to ‘wake up’. She is in a bright white room, looking in a mirror. What, why, and where, we wonder collectively. With only a couple of hours left, and a good number more questions that need answering, Lynch has his work cut out in concluding Twin Peaks: the next double-part episode might possibly be the last ever. But even if it fails to completely satisfy our wonderings, the journey was more than worth it.

Twin Peaks: The Return airs Mondays at 2am in simulcast with the U.S. on Sky Atlantic, and is then repeated at 9pm on Tuesdays.