Month: November 2020

Note: This was written before the GBBO Final

Sad news. This week, I went out of the Great Film SW London Blog Off. While over the last few weeks, I got star blogger, it turns out that last week I totally forgot to mention that I’d watched The Pianist. (This part of the story is true, it was a good film). Therefore, as I was the worst of the week, it now means that the finalists are from some young kid’s website MotspurParkFansOfFilmsLikeCats.com website (He had two good reviews and even told the judges to look at his third review) and DavesMangoAndPassionFruitMovieReviews.blog.com. I wish them both the best in the final week, although I will be supporting LaurasFilms.com where even when watching Paddington 2, she still has some form of breakdown.

Anyway, now onto more pressing issues. Having been trying to go through some best picture winners, I’d realised that since lockdown, I haven’t watched many female directed films. Therefore, I decided to commit to a week of focussing specifically on female directors (with one exception). The rules were simple: It had to be a film directed/co-directed by a woman and it had to be a film I hadn’t seen before.

Sadly this second rule got rid of some great films. Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker, Katia Lund’s City Of God Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird and Little Women, Celine Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Tomboy, Girlhood, or anything by her was banned. Other honourable mentions include The Matrix, Shrek, Leave No Trace and You Were Never Really Here. However, I was left with a set of critically acclaimed films, each of which was very unique.

Little Miss Sunshine (2006) was co-directed by Valerie Faris and Jon Dayton. Frank (Steve Carrell) has recently attempted suicide and has to move in with sister Sheryl (Toni Colette) and her husband Richard (Greg Kinnear). When their daughter gets invited to the Little Miss Sunshine beauty pageant, they all go in this van with their grandfather and two children, one of whom chooses to be mute, and make their way across the country. Obviously everything that can go wrong does go wrong, whether people or cars breaking down.

There was a fair bit I didn’t like about this film. Some of the humour was hit and miss and Steve Carrell’s character only seemed to be there because Steve Carrell was going to be in the film. However, the film did have a heart and it found it by the end, which for most of it I didn’t think it would. It’s a nice family film, however in finding it’s message it’s much too heavy handed.

It was well made and a generally happy piece and maybe if I hadn’t had my heart torn apart by the bake off I would’ve liked it a bit more. A quirky oddball comedy and if you enjoy that type of film, you’ll definitely get something out of this.

Little Miss Sunshine can be rented on most streaming services

On the other end of the film spectrum, you find a really artsy film like Beau Travail (1999) directed by the acclaimed Claire Dennis. It was more of a mood piece than a narrative film and a week after watching it, I can’t really remember what happened. There was a French army in Africa. A new recruit came along, someone got jealous, someone got hurt, someone danced. Frankly, that’s all I can really remember.

It was a film which left you in a trance state. One that my housemate said “reviewers probably rated highly because they didn’t want it to look like they didn’t get it” (It was rated 91% on Metacritic, which is the amount of the movie I spent thinking okay when is it going to start). It’s all a bit slow, however the intense lighting and soundtrack, while not a great home watch, I imagine would’ve been brilliant to see in the cinema. However, in this lockdown, I wouldn’t especially recommend hunting it down.

Beau Travail can be rented on Amazon

Something Useful (2017) really pained me as the first 90 minutes were absolutely fantastic, but then I just got really bored. for the last twenty. Leyla is a lawyer and a poet who meets Canan, a young nursing student who is going for a nursing interview on a train. However, something doesn’t quite seem right as these layers unravel. Canan is always on the phone and is very nervous. We learn that she has offered to assist someone’s suicide. Leyla, unable to keep her nose out of anything agrees to help.

The first part is really deep tonally and symbolically. It’s understated and any part on the train is well worth a watch. However, once we arrive it really does slow down. There isn’t much of a place to go with these characters and once she goes to an event there really isn’t much to be taken from those scenes. If the film was 90 minutes it would’ve easily won the film of the week. If you’re really into action films then you won’t like this. However, there is definitely an audience for such a film with two brilliant intense leads bringing the script to life.

Something Useful is available to stream on MUBI

The world of animation is indeed a great way to bring across difficult issues in a sensitive way. The treatment of woman in Iran is a devistating issue discussed very well in both Persepolis (2007) and The Breadwinner (2017)

Persepolis focuses on the life of Marji, a young Iranian girl when the Shah were defeated in the Iranian revoloution. This is meant to be the beginning of her country’s liberty. However, when Islamic fundamentalists rule, she finds her freedoms to become even more curtailed. We see her grow up, deal with political tragedy, move abroard and struggle with that, and have to deal with everything is going on around her while trying to find her own identity.

95% of the film is in black and white in quite a graphic novel style. Little comic tricks show her emotion very explicitly in a similar way to how Spiderverse did. Its minimalist style really allowed the action to be the centrepoint of this film. The simplicity almost allows the film to give the plot as it is.

Persepolis is by no means a perfect film. The main problem was that they attempted to put far too much into a ninety minute run time which allowed us to see, but not really feel what the character was feeling. The art style may have also taken away from a more realistic issue. It had pros and cons. However, overall I felt it was a well made personal film.

Persepolis is available to rent on most digital platforms

I personally prefered the approach of The Breadwinner (2017), a film which looked at the same topics, but with a more focussed story line. Following the arrest of her father, Parvana can’t buy her siblings or mother anything or work for them as she is a girl. She cuts off her hair and dresses as a boy and attempts to live and work around modern day Iran.

We get a historical context, however its much lighter than Persepolis, with the film ending as a war begins. The animation itself was creative and beautiful with two story arcs coming together for tragic yet well made effects. Its certainly not an easy kids film as there is shooting and beating, but that is the harsh reality of life for women in Iran. The whole film was really well put together and is definitely worth a watch from a very good up and coming animation company.

The Breadwinner is available on Netflix

Film Of The Week

I didn’t really know what to expect going into Mustang (2015). The best foreign language film Oscar nominee was a film I hadn’t even heard of. However, I must say it’s one of the most fully complete films I’ve seen in a while. The story looks at 5 teenage sisters who are living freely in rural Turkey. One day after school they went down the beach with a couple of boys. The affair was totally innocent as they all played in the sea, with no malice or anything appropriate in anybody’s mind. However, a curtain twitching neighbour (It’s honestly Turkey and not Denmead) reports alleged frivolities to the girls’ grandmother. She and their uncle then go about restricting their freedoms before the grandmother parades them around town, looking to marry each one off.

However, these girls don’t take this lying down. The small acts of rebellion, like going to the football and sneaking out each give a sparkle of hope which will make you smile. The painful reality is that each one of these actions has consequences. As tthe movie progresses and the girls all get more desperate and unhappy, the house becomes more and more barred up and becomes a prison. There are some disturbing outrageous topics which come up in this film. As well as the stripping of liberties, there are mentions of doctors who check a girl’s virginity and many other horrific moments. The stakes in the film are high, and they feel very real.

The young actresses in this film were all fantastic. The directing was incredible and the musical score was one of the best I’ve heard in a while. I was fully engrossed in this film as it reached its climax, fearing for the lives of the sisters, not sure whether they would survive. An absolutely essential film.

Mustang is available to watch on MUBI

A few months ago I decided to read Why I’m No Longer Talking To White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge. It was during the height of the Black Lives Matter protests and I decided to see some different perspectives. It was a brilliant book. It was so clear and concise. It was passionate and very informative, a really brilliant read. One of the first chapters was about Black British History. Very quickly I realised that I knew absolutely nothing about this. Each sentence provided me with new information about some of the shames within our country over the past couple of hundred years. These are brushed under the carpet in society and not talked about in schools where all of the history is very self-admiring. One of the stories that Eddo-Lodge wrote about was the events in Notting Hill, the events which this movie focuses on.

Continue reading “Review: Mangrove” →

So it turns out I actually lost the South West London Film Blogs Red By Less Than 10 People award. Unfortunately, MotspurParkFansOfFilmsLikeCats.com beat my by three votes, those jerks. Needless to say, as I wasn’t able to see the count, this issue will be taken to the super film court. I will win the award I deserve.

If there is one genre of film I don’t tend to enjoy, it’s a quirky comedy. Think anything like Knives Out or The Favourite or Death of Stalin. They just aren’t my cup of tea. It is therefore fully to the credit of Amelie (2001) that I didn’t turn it off half way through.

The lead character, of the same name, has grown up strictly in her parents’ home. Her father has never shown her any affection, yet she has this almost gratingly positive attitude, yet is very shy. She then makes her life mission to make people fall in love, while also falling for this other person, but being too shy to contact him directly.

The whole thing could’ve been a bit of a mess. However, the characters on the whole were tolerable and the soundtrack was very charming. I was rather tired when I watched this, so let it fly over me instead of particularly engaging in it. If anything that probably helped, because if you think too much about this film, it probably won’t quite be as good.

On the whole, Amelie provides a really quirky, unique romantic comedy with enough redemption to counter some of the more potentially irritating characters

Amelie is not free, but is available on DVD/Streaming Services

Last week, I discussed the new BBC 2/BFI Partnership, where they are showing lots of new releases on Saturday nights. The most recent one was Perfect 10 (2019). An Essex teenager, Leigh, who has lost her mother recently feels all alone. In gymnastics, nobody is supporting her, the other girls are horrible and she is the only one without a parent there. This is taking a toll and she is struggling. Her dead-beat dad then forces her to live with her half-brother she didn’t know about. He himself has his own issues, however this is the first time Leigh hasn’t been alone. It’s all a bit down the rabbit hole as she gets involved in his activites, yet despite his issues, he is the first person to support her.

The film is a well made, fairly by the numbers film. It isn’t fantastical and you can guess its general direction. However, that doesn’t take away from two good debut performances and a solid directional debut from Eva Riley. The gymnastic moments are well made moments of escapism and a solid metaphor for her life. Interactions between the siblings are entertaining as you are provided two characters you root for. While not a perfect 10, this film is a solid 8.

Perfect 10 is available on BBC iPlayer

The other three films I watched this week were part of my attempt to tick off all 92 best picture winners. I am now up to 25.

The King’s Speech (2010) is the most recent one I watched this week. It’s a fairly by the numbers Oscar bait older drama based on a true story by the not very good director Tom Hooper.

Bertie is the younger child of George V in the 1930s. With the invention of radio, the royals have to be more communicative, an issue for young Bertie as he has had a stammer all of his life. This issue gets increasingly more dramatic, leading to a climax where Bertie’s brother abdicates and he has to be George VI and give a speech at the beginning of WWII. Yeah, that may be a spoiler, but if you know any history, it isn’t really. Who comes to save the day? Well, unorthodox speech therapist Lionel Logue. They buddy up, work through their problems using these strange methods, and lo and behold you’ll never guess what happens.

So, while it is incredibly predictable, the film deserves some credit. It is predominantly carried by some great performances from Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush. If you go in expecting a film to re-invent the wheel, this isn’t the one for you. But if you want a polished movie you can easily watch with the family, then this is the right one. Each character was entertaining enough and it was set up well for Bertie to develop into his character. While the climax had some tonal issues, and Hooper tends to be a kid in a candy shop in an editing room, seriously cuts every few seconds seemingly at random, this isn’t as big an issue when there’s only two people on screen. While this film doesn’t redeem Cats, it at least betters it. An enjoyable easy Friday night watch.

The King’s Speech is on Netflix.

Going back in time now to How Green Was My Valley (1941), the best picture winner which beat Citizen Kane. Now, I’m not a huge Citizen Kane fan, although I appreciate it’s influence. HGWMV had a lot of charm to it. It focuses on a Welsh mining town and a family torn apart by reductions in pay and whether to form a union. The father wants youngest son Huw to have a better life, however there is a question of whether the son will be able to.

There are themes of loyalty and class. What the film does brilliantly is show a vibrant and organic community. Sure, it might be a bit slow in places, but there, but the film shows a place and a period of time rather romantically. We see inequality and the impacts of a whole community specialising in one trade. The impact of health and wealth are all there and vivid, yet hidden behind a very traditional story. It’s worth a watch if you like old movies or are interested. However, others will find it a bit slow.

There is a free video of HGWMV on Youtube.

Film of the Week

1946 was a brilliant year for film. Brief Encounters is, in my opinion, the best romantic film of all time. It’s a Wonderful life is an all time Christmas classic. However, the best picture winner was, and I can’t really argue too much it, The Best Years Of Our Lives (1946), which deservedly wins Film Of The Week.

An allegory to it’s time, TBYOOL is the story of three soldiers coming home from WWII. One is returning to a last minute marriage without any love, but without his status, a job, or much money. Another is returning to a family with his kids all grown up and he doesn’t really know them anymore. A third, played by an actual soldier, returns home with hooks for hands after he lost them in the war. The film focuses on their reintegration and their issues, potently reminding us what those who came home also sacrificed.

At almost three hours long, this film didn’t feel that at all, each scene advancing one of the three interconnected stories usefully. It was big and dramatic with its music as films at the time were. The romantic stories between the soldiers and their romantic interests were each endearing and weighty. It was a beautifully shot character piece which shows the mood of the time and holds up wonderfully today. It can be found easily on youtube.

Good evening. Having only had one vote counted, I am pleased to announce my victory in the South West London Film Blogs Read By Less than 10 People award, taking the trophy from WombleFilms.com and ThePutneyPictures.org. I have demanded that the SWLFBRBLT10P folks stop counting the votes and look forward to being able to call myself South West London’s 14th best film blog for the next four years to come.

We all knew it was coming. Let’s not act shocked. Indeed there is a second lockdown, thus the cinemas are closed. With the weather colder and evenings darker, no longer can I enjoy the summer nights making out under the docks or staying out until 10 o’clock. Instead, it’s time to sit by the radiator and get to the films that “I’ll get around to eventually”.

I’ve previously talked about Pride and Train To Busan, so I won’t discuss them again, but I did watch them. I didn’t even mean to watch the latter. It was on TV and I just didn’t tear myself away.

The first film based thing I finally want to talk about is that BFI and BBC are pairing up to show recently released independent films on TV/IPlayer on Saturdays. I haven’t seen many of these, most were released this year. However, if you want to watch something different, I recommend giving them ago. This week’s offering was Make Up (2019), a psycho-sexual thriller set in a Cornish caravan park. I wrote a review on it which you no doubt can’t wait to read right here, so I will only briefly say that the style is fantastic and unpredictable. The slow pace and isolation reminded me of The Shining. However, it took a lot of time to get going and the characters weren’t written brilliantly. A good debut feature, but with plenty to work on.

Make Up is available on BBC IPlayer

As I can’t see any new films, now is as good a time as any to try and tick off all of the best picture films, one of which being American Beauty (1999). The film focuses on a depressed middle aged man called Lester, who falls for his sixteen year old daughter’s cheerleader friend. The whole film is rather uncomfortable. Thankfully, you learn pretty early on that Lester will die, which was enough to keep me watching.

It’s a really well written film. Sam Mendes (1917) has lots of different plot threads going cleanly, while each is affected by another. It has that sort of fight club feel where the whole theme is disaffection from the American Dream. All of the characters are out of love and looking for something to live for, except in this movie the lads don’t think “oh yeah it would be cool to be him”.

It really doesn’t help that the lead character is played by Kevin Spacey, although that can’t be helped. Otherwise, the story was well written, leading to an intense climax. Admittedly, I got a little bit bored with 10 minutes to go, however I was probably just tired. However, it definitely was well written.

American Beauty is available on Netflix.

The second best picture film of the week was Chicago (2002), the last musical to win a best picture (excluding the 30 seconds where La La Land won it). This is the sort of film I want to win the best picture, something really unique. Roxie Hart (Renee Zellweger) is sent to jail for the murder of her lover at the same time as cabaret singer Velma Kelly (Catherine Zeta-Jones) in the American 20’s.

She hires a lawyer to help her get out of jail, however most of this is all about raising her profile in the media. Everything is for show. As well as this entertaining crime story, Roxie imagines a musical in her mind, with a whole set of jazz songs including the famous “All That Jazz” and “Cell Block Tango”, with these big jazz halls contrasting the grey jail she is in.

The performances were all fantastic. Renee and CZJ were both fantastic, as was Queen Latifah and Richard Gere. The structure of the film with the musical nature interjecting provided something different. It showed a dream throughout and a facade of the judicial system. An upbeat film which was real fun.

Chicago is widely available to purchase on digital services/DVD

The Princess Bride (1987) doesn’t seem like an obvious choice to watch. However, it’s by Rob Reiner who directed Stand By Me and When Harry Met Sally and is a rather popular film, so of course I’d watch it. Set in the format of a grandfather reading his unwell grandson a fantasy book (and thus inspiring every unoriginal sitcom to use that trope), the film has Princess Buttercup stolen from the Kingdom by an evil man and his two henchmen, Fezzik and Inigo Montoya (His father is dead). Soon enough, her first love, Westley, goes to get her back, before the evil prince traps him and takes Buttercup back to the castle to marry him.

Seems like a bit of a cliché right? Yeah, it is. The whole film is styled as a comedy. It’s a parody of the classic fairy tale and it made me laugh a few times. The most obvious comparison is to Shrek. While Shrek jumps unapologetically into the parody, undermining tropes, The Princess Bride leans in a but more gently and unfortunately, the big green ogre may have taken away some of the impact of this piece.

However, it still deserves a fair amount of praise. It was new at the time. It’s well written, charming and a generally entertaining movie. Sure, the bad child acting narration thing was slightly irritating, but there was enough charm for me to give it a pass. It also has that famous line that Inigo Montoya says as well as having inspired a whole generation of fencers no doubt.

The Princess Bride is available on Amazon Prime Video

There are some films which are timeless, and it’s difficult to argue that City Lights (1931) is anything but that. The silent film is the oldest film I’ve ever seen. Featuring Charlie Chaplin, it provides a really entertaining harmless form of comedy for the whole family.

Chaplin plays a tramp who falls in love with a blind woman. She think’s he’s rich and Chaplin’s character will do what he can to help her pay her rent and get surgery to see anything. The black and white style doesn’t matter, because the set pieces are fantastic. The scene of him saving the rich man is laugh out loud funny and the boxing scene is absolutely iconic. The body language and facial expressions of Chaplin show why he is regarded as one of the all time greatest actors.

I don’t know what else I can say. It’s brilliant. The story works because it’s simple. The humour is fantastic. The characters are all brilliant in their own rights and distinct. The music is chirpy and upbeat. It’s 89 years old, yet as good as anything you’ll see today. Give it a watch.

City Lights can be found for free on Youtube.

Film Of The Week

Vertigo (1958), simply wow…

What an absolutely brilliant film this was. A fantastic script, two brilliant performances. A wonderful sense of intrigue and then tension. A psychological thriller showing a horribly complicated romance and desire.

Detective Scottie Ferguson has a fear of heights, or vertigo, which he tragically discovers on a police chase gone wrong. As soon as he retires, an old friend asks him to follow their wife, Madeline, who seems to be possessed by her great grandmother, who was suicidal at the same age her wife was at the time. This becomes a chase and a mystery, before the whole film totally transforms half way through.

This is known as one of the all time great films and for good reason. There really isn’t anything I can fault within it. I was totally on board for the whole thing and I can’t wait to watch it again.

Vertigo is available to watch on Netflix.

So you may not have heard that the cinemas have closed. How sad. It means that I have much more time and much less releases to look out for. However, there is hope. The BFI and BBC are teaming up to show a new British Independent film released in 2020 each week on Saturday Night on BBC Two and BBC IPlayer. Therefore, at least for the next month, I’ll be turning my attention to them, while also returning to the What I Watched This Week posts.

Make Up is a really weird film. Set in a Cornish caravan park in the winter, young couple Ruth (Molly Windsor) and Tom (Joseph Quinn) are working off season, keeping the place tidy while it’s being fumigated. Tom lives locally, while Ruth came down all the way from Derby, no doubt attempting to avoid a Tier 3 lockdown. Pretty soon in, Ruth notices some ginger hairs on Tom’s bedding. The film becomes a bit of a psycho-sexual thriller as she investigates who this ginger person is, even though nobody at the camp remembers anybody ginger being there. Infused with horror moments, the film takes many turns throughout.

Continue reading “Review: Make Up” →