Category: Film Review

CAUTION: Only watch this film if you like your comedy JET BLACK. Dark comedies rarely get darker or meaner than Ben Wheatley’s misanthropic road-trip satire Sightseers. Sort of like the British version of Bobcat Goldthwait’s hysterical underrated gem God Bless America mixed with shades of Falling Down and Happiness, it’s a film that revels in its diseased nastiness, and one that has a distinct (if deranged) point of view concerning society and its various malfunctions. Lead actors and co-screenwriters Alice Lowe and Steve Oram are both terrifically vile and frequently hilarious, going totally for broke with their insane conceit, never looking back one, and matched every step of the way by a director who was totally in synch with their poisonous yet smart worldview. Wheatley is such a playful sadist and has such a great sense of visual space that he allows the film to open innocuously, only to then pepper the proceedings with one transgressive moment after the next. The unassuming yet stylish cinematography from Laurie Rose also plays with expectations, favoring day light for all of the big, nasty moments of violence, and placing an emphasis on camera placement and off the cuff shot selections. The toxically hilarious and ironic final moments are absolutely unforgettable. Wheatley’s wife, Amy Jump, was an additional contributor to the script, while Edgar Wright served as one of the producers. Sightseers screened at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival as part of the Director’s Fortnight section, and is really a movie only for those who enjoy the bitter and unrelentingly sour taste of cruel.

 

Enemy, the glorious head-scratcher from French Canadian director Denis Villeneuve (Prisoners, Incendies, Sicario, the upcoming Story of Your Life and Blade Runner 2), is a twisted mystery with all sorts of philosophically loaded implications. Is it the slyest version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers that’s ever been pulled off? Is it a metaphysical exploration of divided souls hovering in a unique state of otherworldly stasis? Is it the simple yet complex story of one many having a nervous breakdown? Or is it none of those things and something completely different? That’s the brilliance of this tricky, multi-layered, and extra-creepy piece of work, which features an on-fire Jake Gyllenhaal in dual performances. One version of Jake is a regular office dweller, repressed and atypical, going about his daily routine without much in the way of surprise, and the other Jake is the ultimate version of himself, what we project ourselves to be: Commanding, sexy, dangerous, and strong. When the two of these entities “meet,” the film becomes a mind-twisting exploration of identity and fate, all filtered through the always intriguing notion of the doppelganger. Based on Jose Saramago’s novel The Double, Villeneuve shoots in Fincher-esque pea-soup green and piss-stained yellow, giving the film an ominous visual sheen that’s both highly sketchy and ugly-slick. Each shot is perfectly designed, and I’m sure a frame-by-frame analysis of this film would be immensely rewarding. And then there’s the film’s final shot, which is a massive doozy, a true show-stopper, a legit candidate for the most WTF moment of any cinematic year. Actually, make that the film’s last TWO shots. It’ll create the impulse to hit the rewind button on your Blu-ray remote, as the stunned look on your face quickly gives way to nervous laughter, and then full on dread, followed by a discussion with yourself or the person(s) you’re watching it with. This is a hot-blooded mental-mind-fuck that will play twister with your brain.

 

Directed by Stanley Kubrick’s ghost by using Jonathan Glazer’s body as a vessel, the eerie, creepy, totally brilliant (and disgustingly underrated — 38% at Rottentomatoes – are people insane?) 2004 movie Birth is a film that gets absolutely no love. And that’s just wrong – anything this powerful and trippy needs to be repeatedly studied, explored, and discussed. A complete 180 in terms of style and tone from his debut picture, the crime masterpiece Sexy Beast, Birth marked new territory for Glazer as a filmmaker. Visually haunting at every turn (shot by the late, legendary director of photography Harris Savides), with a memorable classical musical score that accentuates every scene, this is a hard-to-describe drama about a grieving widow (Nicole Kidman, never better except for maybe in To Die For), who is paid a visit by a 10 year old boy (Cameron Bright, also excellent in Wayne Kramer’s exuberantly nasty Running Scared) who claims to be her reincarnated husband. From the chilly opening moments of this offbeat, strangely wondrous film, you’re under Glazer’s moody directorial spell, and he never lets you out of his stylish grasp for the entire run-time.

One shot in particular – that of Kidman entering an in-progress opera in an extremely fragile emotional state, all done in one, extra-long take – is one of the greatest single shots I’ve ever seen in any movie. A bit hyperbolic maybe, but trust me, you’ll be blown away by the power of this extended moment, which ranks as the best single scene of acting Kidman’s ever given us; the shot means more because it heightens the narrative while stretching the limits of Glazer’s striking visual aesthetic. Alexandre Desplat’s soulful, haunting, and almost overwhelming score sets a funeral tone from the first moment, offering moments of psychological acuity not normally reserved for musical arrangements. Honestly, I dare not spoil ANYTHING to the uninformed viewer; the less you know about this film going in, the better of you’ll be. This is the sort of cult-favored classic that Twilight Time DVD Label or The Criterion Collection should look into licensing, a film made by a still budding auteur, and now with the popularity of Glazer’s hypnotic game-changer Under the Skin, I think it’s time that more appreciation be heaped upon Birth, as it’s truly one-of-a-kind in all the best ways that cinema can offer.

To say David Lynch has elicited a head-scratching moment or two in his career is akin to carrying on about the wetness of water; even at his most commercial, an air of mystery and the surreal lurks at the edges, and at his most personal, nightmare logic and a dreamy take on the familiar are pervasive.  Having soured on answering to studio heavy-handedness after Dune, much like Kubrick did after Spartacus, Lynch has gone on to craft stubbornly individual cinema and television, much to the delight of his many followers.  In 1997, after having alienated a large contingent of drive-by Twin Peaks fans with the “valentine wrapped in barbed wire” prequel to the television series, Fire Walk With Me, he unleashed Lost Highway onto an unsuspecting public, and heads were scratched like never before.  The film starts with an oppressive, almost claustrophobic quiet and dread, then builds to a frenetic, hallucinatory finale that is shot through with pure madness.  In between, we are shown murder and sex, as well as rebirth and metamorphosis.  Noir tropes abound, set to one of the most varied and contemporary soundtracks of Lynch’s career.  Even if you’ve strung a narrative together in your head by the end, the closing shot remains a source of debate.  In other words, hardly an easy two hours of escapism at the multiplex.  That said, stringing a narrative together is a valuable and, if you’ve been paying attention to how this director tells stories throughout his career, highly rewarding exercise.

First of all, the idea that one part of the film is fantasy while the other is “real” needs to be set aside.  We are, after all, watching a film, not our neighbors in the real world walking their dog down the street.  Film is fiction, and Lynch is always asking his audience to go on a journey into the unreal.  Even what can be construed as the foundational happenings in Lost Highway are weaving in and out of reality; we’re told early on that we are being led by a particularly unreliable narrator who likes to remember things his own way.  This is Fred, the protagonist albeit hardly hero of the tale.  He has more in common with the ill-fated Leland Palmer than some of Lynch’s more traditional leads played by Kyle Maclachlan; his double life teetered between respectability and murderous rampages, and Fred’s is on the verge of crossing over those boundaries as we meet him.  Reminiscent of Killer Bob in Twin Peaks, our eyes are first drawn to the lanky doppleganger of a shadow that follows Fred around his home as he grows to suspect his wife Renee of infidelity, and soon see this dark side, the evil that men do (or are about to do) personified as The Mystery Man.  Robert Blake’s relentlessly eerie performance is wide-eyed and shot through with delight at the thought that Fred will succumb to his worst instincts, and his appearance in conjunction with the video tapes that start showing up are our first clues that even at this early stage of the game, Fred and Lost Highway are not telling us a straight story.  Nothing about the supposed external threats presented by Blake’s character or the videotapes make sense, nor should they:  They are fragments of Fred’s frayed psyche informing and inspiring the heinous act to come.

To continue piecing together Lost Highway’s labyrinth descent, it’s oddly appropriate to fast forward to Lynch’s later film, the celebrated Mulholland Drive.  A bit of a Frankenstein Monster itself, Mulholland Drive was originally conceived as a Twin Peaks style serialized mystery, but after fearful ABC Network suits decided it was too dark for a post-Columbine audience and pulled the plug Lynch was given the funding and opportunity to turn it into a feature film.  Instead of tacking on a whodunit ending, he followed Lost Highway’s lead and recast the tale as a doomed romance that ends in murder, with the perpetrator once again fleeing reality for a large part of the movie until whatever strands of reality exist come slithering, then crashing, through the façade.  The order of operations is different—Mulholland Drive starts with the escapist dream of “Betty,” who envisions a lively Hollywood yarn with her former girlfriend re-cast as an amnesiac best friend, and then we are shown snapshot scenes of how Betty’s true self, Diane, actually loved and lost and arranged to have her ex murdered.  Lost Highway, on the other hand, begins with what can be briefly referred to as Fred’s reality and then jumps into the fantasy in its second act, when Fred reimagines himself as the young hotshot mechanic Pete, surrounded by willing lovers and fast cars, being the focus of a cheating blonde’s affection instead of the scorned cuckold husband.  Like Rita in Mulholland Drive, even a seemingly game and pliable imagined version of the object of his desire named Alice quickly breaks down and declares herself as unattainable as Renee was.

As usual, Lynch surrounds himself with high quality cohorts.  Peter Deming’s lensing is sublime, capturing the inky blacks and blood reds of the opening as well as the sun-dappled Los Angeles Fred imagines Pete is adventuring through, with whirlwind, heat and flash defining the chaotic imagery of the finale.  Angelo Badalamenti turns in yet another classic score, filled with everything from the fiery jazz of Red Bats With Teeth to the appropriately sad Haunting & Heartbreaking to the devastating Fred’s World.  He’s joined this time by the likes of David Bowie and Trent Reznor, who provide a thrilling opening and a brutal finale, respectively.  Longtime editor Mary Sweeney is razor sharp, and co-writer Barry Gifford adds the Pinter-esque sparseness of his prose in much of the simple but mysterious dialogue. Memorable performances abound, and not just from the aforementioned Blake and Bill Pullman playing against type as Fred—Robert Loggia lights up the screen as rage-fuelled Mr. Eddy/Dick Laurent, Balthazar Getty and Natasha Gregson Wagner stick the landing as young lovers caught up in a much meaner game than either could imagine, Gary Busey manages his sanest appearance in front of a camera in several decades, and even Richard Pryor and Henry Rollins show up for memorable cameos.  The heavy lifting throughout is done by Patricia Arquette, who even by the rough standards of existence most women find in Lynchland has a relentlessly tough row to hoe.  Playing not one but two objects of mad desire, she is a sexual fantasy and lurid crime victim, and one can’t help applaud her fortitude in pulling Renee/Alice off (she famously called Lynch “Satan” on set at one juncture of the shoot, indicating the roles certainly took a toll).

In all, it’s a typically dense film for Lynch, perhaps one of his most complicated on the surface, yet driven by a fundamental emotional simplicity at its core.  We are witness to a cycle of jealousy and pain, followed by violence and confusion, and that final shot mentioned above leaves the door open to the cycle continuing, as Fred appears to be morphing yet again, perhaps into Pete, perhaps into something new.  For me, the pounding soundtrack and swarm of police cars combined with the smoke and flashing lights around Fred has always felt symbolic (as many moments in the final act do as Fred reemerges) of the killer finding a final home on the electric chair, but who knows?  Even with a relatively clear overarching story, Lost Highway will always hide at least a few secrets away, like a smiling Mystery Man who’s just glad to watch his companions stumble about in confusion.

Room is a gut punch. This film snuck up on me and overpowered my emotions. I knew the general gist before sitting down, but I wasn’t prepared for how powerful the film would be. Lenny Abrahamson’s critically acclaimed film concentrates on a horrifying, immensely terrible situation – the imprisonment of a woman with the subsequent birth of a child in captivity – and does so with verve, intelligence, and a keen understanding of what constitutes as cinematic. Brie Larson, in nothing less than a shattering performance, conveys every emotion you might think possible for a human being, never over emoting or coming off as grandstanding; there’s a level of sensitivity to her work in this film that was gracious and revealing, though all of her previous performances have hinted at this doozy of a role. In film after film, especially Short Term 12, Greenberg, and her scene stealing work in Trainwreck, she’s been a major attraction, and in Room, she’s given a part that every single actress must’ve been dying to get. And very much her equal is newcomer Jacob Tremblay, who plays her five year old son, and does so with a sense of honesty and openness usually reserved for actors ten times his age. The filmmakers have taken the interesting approach by focusing the story on Tremblay, with much of the film unfolding through his internalized point of view, which makes the narrative even more contextualized and layered. It’s important to note that, yet again, another challenging and distinctive piece of art was produced by the people at A24; if only they could figure out the distribution portion of the filmmaking process.

Make no mistake – this film is not going to sit well with many people, as it’s themes are beyond disturbing, emotionally devastating, and all too believable; this sort of thing happens way too often. By shooting in 2.35:1 widescreen in such a cramped setting, Abrahamson and his sharp cinematographer Danny Cohen play with expressionistic angles and skewed vantage points, as the first 45 minutes of this movie are almost entirely contained to the nightmarish shed that Larson and Tremblay have been calling home. The sequence showing Tremblay’s escape is knot-in-your-stomach intense; I haven’t been that edge of my seat in a long time in a theater, at least since the tunnel sequence in Sicario. And when you mix in “This Will Destroy You” by The Mighty Rio Grande on the soundtrack, those moments take on massive visceral impact. Again, Abrahamson’s inherent understanding of what’s cinematic in a story like this is sort of bracing to witness; time after time, this movie doesn’t exactly do what you think it will. Joan Allen is terrific in a small but pivotal supporting role, and the final act stings with a truthful poignancy that wisely makes it clear that NOTHING is OK by the time the credits start rolling. I questioned one, maybe two small things from a plot standpoint, but they were hardly major issues. And as a new parent, I’d be lying if I said that this movie didn’t make me upset on numerous occasions, as there’s something so primal about the ideas at play during this unquestionably forceful piece of filmmaking and storytelling.

Straight Outta Compton is robust, vital entertainment, painting a vivid tapestry of one of the most turbulent periods of modern societal unrest, and telling an oversized, extremely engrossing tale that’s distinctly American and part of the greater cultural shift over the last 20 years. In a field of 10 potential nominees, even if I felt that there were better films, I am shocked that this movie didn’t have enough votes to get a Best Picture nomination with the Academy, especially considering the fact that it received a hat tip in the Original Screenplay category. It’s timely, it’s provocative, and it’s BIG. But whatever…Oscars or no Oscars…the movie was a massive critical and box office success, and for journeyman director F. Gary Gray, easily the best, most polished work of his career. The film has a dynamic visual style thanks to the slick yet gritty cinematography by Matthew Libatique, and it goes without saying, the movie moves to a SERIOUSLY awesome beat as a result of the near constant greatest hits that play over the soundtrack. Performances across the board are excellent and emotionally affecting, especially those by Jason Mitchell as Eazy-E, O’Shea Jackson, Jr. as Ice Cube (Cube’s son in real life, hence the uncanny physical resemblance), and Corey Hawkins as Dr. Dre. All three of these guys absolutely ripped into their roles with conviction and gusto, and are never unconvincing at any point. They have a great sense of chemistry with one another, and they all complimented each other’s performances by never allowing any one actor to overly dominate.

And what Gray and his crew of screenwriters achieved extremely well in Straight Outta Compton was to present the viewer with a time capsule of a city, and a nation, in flux, with the topical discussion of racism and unnecessary brutality and harassment at the hands of the police still an important and incendiary top of discussion. Gangster rap is as American as apple pie and baseball, intrinsically linked to certain sections of this country, with seepage occurring at random and all over. To denounce gangster rap as sensationalistic or as a glamorization of violence and drugs and misogyny would require you to push back against years of TV shows and movies that have all done the same thing – exploit the exploitable elements with a certain degree of swagger. But the difference, if you’re paying attention, was that there were messages in the songs of NWA, songs that spoke to a distinct set of people first and foremost, but offered a glimpse into another world for many others. Yes, the film has a traditional arc, and you get the scenes you’d expect from the musical biopic genre, but even then there’s a zesty sense of professionalism occurring in every filmmaking department. Fans of NWA will love this film, and the uninitiated should walk out with a new understanding, and hopefully respect, for an art form that may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but one that speaks its mind loud and clear, with an understanding of the difficulties of life at the center of the action. Version screened was a Blu-ray of the 2 hour 50 minute unrated director’ cut; I think I know which bit of sexual shenanigans was cut by the prudish asses at the MPAA.