Review:: Drive

Nicolas Winding-Refn, the mecurially stylish eye best known for the fantastic Pusher trilogy in his native Denmark and the wickedly dark Bronson, takes another stab at breakout success with Drive. This collaboration with Ryan Gosling, who’s star cache apparently helped drive the film’s creation, works much better than Refn’s earlier English-language work, Fear X, the underrated but admittedly uneven John Turturro vehicle.

With its quiet, melancholic characters, its focus on repressed masculinity and its elegant, washed out LA landscape, Drive is heavily indebted to the works of Michael Mann, as well as most obviously The Driver, Walter Hill’s enigmatic 1978 thriller.

What the film lacks in orginality it more than makes up for in an absolutely entrancing ambience, stunning direction, fleshed out performances and perfect soundtrack. Put simply, this is the best arthouse action film to come out of America for years, right up there with the likes of Heat and Leon.

Gosling plays an introverted stunt car driver who gets himself drawn into a murky underworld through his attraction to a neighbour, played by Carey Mulligan. Gosling is a likeable protagonist, but more of a silent, ambiguous cipher than anything, his scorpion jacket, cool driving and bursts of violence more arresting than his words or personality. The rest of the cast, punctuated by meaty turns by Bryan Cranston, Albert Brooks and Ron Perlman, bring more rounded life to their characters.

Like previous Refn films, moments of violence are minimal yet shocking in their immediacy. Marketed rather cynically as an action-packed driving film, followers of Refn will be unsurprised to find that Drive is much more subdued than its trailers might suggest. The film is imbued with an almost Kubrick-esque visual meticulousness, a fascinating and utterly absorbing ethereal quality. Ultimately that’s what makes Drive such a success. The film transcends usual crime heist fare, evoking a wonderful, bizarre LA unreality.

Rating: 8.5/10

Review Roundup: Larks on a String, The Wedding Song, Bicycle Thieves

Check out some of my recent World Cinema DVD reviews for Subtitled Online, below.

 

Jiří Menzel’s long-lost black political comedy Larks on a String

Karin Albou’s WWII drama The Wedding Song

Vittorio De Sica’s 1948 Italian neorealist masterpiece Bicycle Thieves

Of Gods and Men: A Dissenting View

When I finally got round to watching Of Gods and Men, I had a peculiar reaction. I despised the film, to point of being offended by it. I’m astonished at its universal acclaim. As far as I’m aware there are pretty much zero bad reviews for this film.

Well, I had to put that right.

Below you can read my damning verdict for Subtitled Online

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A huge critical success, Of Gods And Men tells the story of the French Roman Catholic monks tragically caught up in the Algerian Civil War in the mid-90s. The film is the product of a collaboration between Etienne Comar, a French Catholic who wrote and produced, and director Xavier Beauvois, whose interesting oeuvre thus far includes the dramas Don’t Forget You’re Going To Die (1995), The Young Lieutenant (2005) and Villa Amalia (2009).

Mirroring the solemn and repetitive nature of a life given over entirely to religious worship and self-sacrifice, the film’s slight and slow narrative follows a group of French monks in their day to day activities in a small Algerian village. Their stoic, peaceful and altruistic existence is thrown into turmoil by the civil war, and their involvement with a group of Muslim rebels located in the mountains nearby.

The monks, led by the excellently reserved Lambert Wilson, are forced to help an injured rebel, and are unwittingly thrown into the middle of the region’s war-time tensions. As inevitable tragedy creeps toward them, passionate disagreements erupt, and the group must decide between their faith and self-preservation…

Of Gods And Men focuses very acutely on the experiences of its French monks – not in itself a bad thing – but, unfortunately, this comes at the detriment of a wider understanding of Algeria’s problems (the French role at the heart of these problems), and a rounded picture of the Algerian individuals represented in the film.

Beauvois and Comar’s film is so deeply ensconced in the ponderous rhythms and profound faith of the Trappist monks’ life that it entirely forgoes characterisation of any Algerian – whether villager, fundamentalist or governmental – and offers no explanations for their troubling actions, or the national conflict which shapes and propels the film’s narrative. Possibly the film’s creators assume a knowledge on the part of the audience of the intricacies of Algeria’s history of colonial rule under the French, and the religious and socio-political troubles the country has battled since being granted independence in 1962. Given their shared history, certainly French audiences are more likely to be familiar with the Algerian Civil War than others, and films are often admirable and successful when focusing on the specifics and the quotidian, letting the audience draw wider political conclusions for themselves.

The problem with Of Gods And Men, however, is that its specific focus does not encourage, or even allow the viewer to expand on its minutiae in order to gain a greater understanding of the internal or external conflict. The unflinching focus on the monks comes at the expense of the Algerians, resulting in a simplistic, Manichean representation of the political situation.

Whereas the monks are consistently bathed in imagery of holiness, purity, goodness and warmth, the aggression of the Algerian Muslim ‘extremists’ is half-heartedly painted as illogical, ignorant and paradoxically anti-religious. Elsewhere, the Algerian army is sinister, dangerous and unhelpful, government ministers corrupt, and the villagers – the only half-way positive representations of Algerians in the whole film – are disinterestedly weak, simple and needy.

The night before the narrative’s climactic event, the monks hold a ‘last supper’ with Tchaikovsky soaring loudly on the soundtrack. For a film which largely forgoes explicit sentimentalisation in favour of silence, slowness and poetic religiosity, this overwrought scene betrays the emotional simplicity in the film’s formulation. These monks are revered – unrealistically, almost mythically – as paragons of virtue, patience and love, symbols of a ‘correct’ form of religion: white, European, civilised and Christian.

Algerians, under oppressive French colonial rule from 1830 to 1962, should be offended by a French production which represents their resulting troubles through the exalting story of a group of morally pure white French Christians, and their evil treatment at the hands of Algerian brutes. Only once during the film is France’s colonial past in Algeria mentioned – an offhand gesture to complexity – and in producing a story which asks us to sympathise with a group of colonial leftovers in lieu of Algerian victims, Of Gods And Men presents an unpleasantly simplistic, Eurocentric representation of history.

The performances are first class, and the film holds a largely consistent and evocative mood of patience, melancholy and glacial tension. By removing Muslim atrocities from their political context, however, the film paints a simplistic and conservative snapshot of history, with an ultimately unfaithful pretention toward universal profundity.

Rating: 2 Stars

Review:: Source Code

Duncan Jones’ debut film as writer and director, Moon, married a clever conceit with subtle constraint, emotional heft and a captivating central performance by Sam Rockwell. One of the best science fiction films in decades, Jones’ name became a by-word for potential greatness overnight.

His next feature is this time only directorial in nature. The screenplay was written by Ben Ripley, the genius behind both Species III and Species: The Awakening. To be fair to Ripley, you have to start somewhere, and Source Code is a huge step-up in substance and weight for him. Unfortunately, it’s a pretty big step down for Jones. Source Code is a sturdy and competent sci-fi thriller, engaging and deftly paced, crafted with intelligence, but rather unsatisfactory, let down by odd narrative choices and a hideous final act.

The film’s premise – the same eight minutes being played out on repeat in a crisis-ridden train – is indebted to a litany of superior films, including North by Northwest, Strangers on a Train, Rashomon, Groundhog Day, Memento and 12 Monkeys. There’s also shades of Philip K. Dick, Inception and Jonathan Demme’s remake of The Manchurian Candidate. Basically, if you get out of the cinema and can immediately reel off ten films which you’re reminded of, then the film in question may well have a certain originality problem.

Now, what Jones and Ripley do with this uninspired premise is engage you with thrills and suspense to the point where the film’s derivative nature becomes secondary. Source Code is smartly, assuredly filmed and snappily paced. The biggest mistake that could have been made here is for the thing to lag, and this never happens. The film jogs along happily, occasionally surprising you, but rarely challenging you. Gyllenhaal gives a likable and believable hero and Vera Farmiga is superb as his conflicted base contact, doing a lot with quite a little. Michelle Monaghan’s love interest is typically bland, however, and Jeffrey Wright’s overseer and Michael Arden’s villain are both criminally underdeveloped and hammily portrayed.

For a mainstream sci-fi thriller, Source Code takes some intelligent and philosophical turns, but Gyllenhaal’s hero solves the central mystery surprisingly easily. The final ten or so minutes is the film’s biggest flaw, however, a tacked-on happy ending which ludicrously undermines the film’s internal logic without explanation. So confidently and professionally made, Source Code should give Jones leeway to produce more interesting fare in the future. As it is, the film shrinks in Moon’s shadow.

Rating: 7/10

Review:: Rango

In Gore Verbinski’s Pirates trilogy, Johnny Depp’s character was a walking Keith Richards impersonation. In Verbinski’s newest film Depp’s eponymous protagonist also has shades of parody and impersonation. Rango is a sanitised version of Depp’s own beloved portrayal of Hunter S. Thompson in Terry Gilliam’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, albeit transposed into a fun, surreal animated cowboy movie.

Ignoring the Pirates films, Rango is closest to earlier Verbinski efforts such as Mouse Hunt (1997) and The Mexican (2001). The film displays a similar love of screwball humour, knowing dialogue, odd slapstick and surreal asides. It’s also his best film, because these traits are securely fastened to a rip-roaring Western tale which should genuinely appeal to the whole family. Much is made of animated films with ‘jokes for the parents’. This invariably means one or two bland innuendos amidst the action scenes, or an ‘adult’ sentimentality which comes off as saccharine garbage. Here, though, we have an animated feature with genuinely adult humour. Film references, absurd humour, fast-flowing gags and narrative eccentricities are not window dressing here, but the very sustenance of the film.

There’s a danger, at times, that this could come off as a little too sly, a little too postmodern and a little too clever. Pixar have raised the standard in terms of this balance, and Rango is much darker and stranger than any feature yet produced by that universally adored stable. All the better, though. Pixar need to be challenged by other innovative mainstream CGI films, and this collaboration between Nickelodeon Movies, Blink Wink, GK Films and Industrial Light & Magic is singular, funny and risk-taking.

Depp’s character, a nervy fantasist chameleon, is likeable and sympathetic in his transformation from loner to hero, and the rest of the cast play along with infectious enjoyment. Especially good are Alfred Molina (as a wise armadillo) and Isla Fisher (as the brave and sharp love interest). As the lost Rango becomes sheriff of his newfound town and begins his quest to uncover the mysterious lack of water, genre conventions are played out, sometimes with parodic, satirical intent and sometimes with heartfelt verve. There’s an earnest spin on individualism and companionship which binds the wacky tale together.

Unfortunately, the last quarter of the film’s pace dips slightly, as the mazy plot gets a little too carried away with itself and the rapid-fire gags dry up. The film here descends slightly into the generic clichés it earlier ridiculed. Despite this, a great love of film permeates every sequence, as Westerns both classic and comedy are paid homage to. The visuals are sublime, too, full of dirt and sweat and feeling, capturing the boundless expanse of the desert with surrealistic, inventive aplomb. As so much CGI starts to look identical, this film is a triumph of original art and design.  Although its knowing humour appears trite at times, Rango is a smart new approach to animated films, one which values edginess and intelligence as much as universal appeal.

Rating: 8/10

 

Review:: Confessions

Confessions opens with an extended sequence which can only be described as a cinematic tour de force. A teacher, Yuko (Takako Matsu), talks to her unruly class in a near-whisper. What at first appears a rambling, inconsequential story – which the kids ignore – gradually turns into a tragic and bizarre account of recent events. By the end, her class is rigid with amazement and fear, and so are the film’s audience. Opening a film with an extended monologue is a risky gambit, but Tetsuya Nakashima’s masterful direction here gives the sequence an otherworldly , hugely engrossing feel. As Yuka’s tale twists and turns , Nakashima plays with speed and sequencing, cutting away to fragments from the story, cutting back to the classroom, changing tone and music with inventive, hyperactive vigour.

It’s almost inevitable that the rest of Confessions can’t quite live up to such an opening. Yuka’s act of vengeance on two students, Shuya (Yukito Nishii) and Naoki (Kaoru Fujiwara), for the death of her child, spirals out into the lives of her pupils during the following term. The film is set up as a series of confessions by various characters, meaning a number of key scenes are continually repeated, seen from different perspectives as extra details are teased out. This method is generally carried off well, but by the end the repetition borders on numbing.

The performances, music and direction of Confessions is first class, but your enjoyment of the film will depend largely on your stomach for a bleak, nihilistic tale of revenge, smattered with horrific scenes of senseless violence and murder. Comparisons have been made with Park Chan-wook’s 2003 masterpiece Oldboy, but despite sharing the theme of revenge and a similar technical, stylistic inventiveness, Confessions is a much simpler film. Whilst it flirts with explorations of morality and the fragility of life, the film eventually comes out more as a fun and slightly wacky horror film. The film lacks the charisma and humanity of a central protagonist such as Oh Dae-su, as the pupils are all either spineless bullies or psychopaths, and Yuka herself is somewhat cold and absent.

Despite such reservations, Confessions is a fabulously entertaining and engaging caper. A lot of fun is clearly being had by cast and crew alike, and this sense of adventure and imagination, of tongue-in-cheek humour, curbs the excesses of bleak violence which threaten to spill over. Whilst pop culture style is more in evidence here than deep substance, Confessions is dark, clever, blood-splattered fun.

7.5/10

Review:: Submarine

Richard Ayoade is probably best known in the UK for his wooden, hugely annoying role in the execrable Graham Linehan-penned car crash The IT Crowd. His stilted, nasally, ‘bad-on-purpose’ shtick can also be seen in other variable Channel 4 comedies such as Chris Morris’ Nathan Barley, Garth Marenghi’s Dark Place and Man to Man with Dean Learner. Thus far you’d be forgiven for mistaking Ayoade as someone generally coasting to a mediocre comedy career on the back of being a bit funny-looking and being mates with people more talented (I’m looking at you, Morris).

Ayoade has confidently broken away from such harsh assumptions with this, his debut directorial feature length, which he also wrote, adapted from the novel by Joe Dunthorne. In Submarine, Ayoade shows a capacity for visual flair and warm characterisation which suggests the man is much more comfortable behind the camera, which is good news for everyone.
 
A coming-of-age story set in 80s Swansea, the film tells the tale of Craig Robert’s Oliver, dealing with his parent’s troubled marriage and a first romance, with Yasmin Paige’s Jordana. Roberts and Paige are excellent, both capable of nasty behaviour but ultimately likeable and relatable, but the real stars are Oliver’s parents, played by Sally Hawkins and Noah Taylor. There’s a real eye for emotional detail in their portrayal, a warmth, wit and honesty in the picture of a loving relationship on the brink. Hawkin’s repressed, desperate Jill and Taylor’s feeble, smart, depressed Lloyd steal the show, with Paddy Considine also having a great time as the neighbour, a hilarious, giant-mulleted psychic coach.

Submarine, however, is the type of film which will undoubtedly draw mixed reactions. Its tone is highly ironic and, dare I say the word, quirky. It’s a great film to look at, but it’s so full of film references, obviously so heavily indebted to its influences, that the more cynical viewer may well be put off. Quick, stylised edits and surreal flights of fancy are the order of the day here, bringing to mind another British director who graduated from the UK comedy scene, Edgar Wright. The main influence here, however, is the French New Wave, filtered through the lenses of Hal Ashby and Wes Anderson. Some shots are so explicitly reminiscent of Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums, in particular, that one can’t help but wince.
 
With that said, it is absolutely refreshing to see a British film put together with visual courage and an off-kilter sensibility, and Ayoade should be praised not pilloried. What debut film is not indebted to its influences? Genuine talent is shown in harnessing such material and producing a fast-moving, snappy, engaging and laugh-out-loud funny film. What Submarine lacks in originality it more than makes up for in wit, warmth and ambition.

Rating: 8/10