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Non-Review Review: Star Wars – Episode VII: The Force Awakens

Posted on December 16, 2015 by Darren

Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens is the Star Wars film you’re looking for. Mostly.

In many respects, Star Wars was the film the helped to launch the modern “blockbuster” model of cinema, and a large part of The Force Awakens is the reassurance that not too much has changed in the intervening years. Sure, there are a few script tweaks to reflect more modern tastes for the post-Dark Knight era, but the basic storytelling engine is still the same underneath. If The Force Awakens is a hybrid, it is a hybrid fashioned from the parts of the three original Star Wars films and just a dash of something more twenty-first century.

The Force is strong with this one…

After the issues with the prequels, it is reassuring to know that the engine still runs. The franchise’s history as one of the forerunners of blockbuster cinema makes it perfectly suited to JJ Abrams’ nostalgic stylings. Abrams gets a lot of flack for his evocation of seventies and eighties blockbuster cinema, but he does have a fundamental understanding of how (and why) it works. Ever the keen student of Spielberg and vintage Hollywood blockbusters, director JJ Abrams is able to effortlessly blend that classic aesthetic with a contemporary sensibilities.

There are moments when The Force Awakens threatens to suffocate under the weight of what came before, but it largely succeeds on its own terms as a doorway to something new and exciting.

Handover from one generation to the next…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: film, jj abrams, Lucasfilm, memory, Movie, non-review review, nostalgia, review, star wars, the force awakens | 45 Comments »

Non-Review Review: The Heart of the Sea

Posted on December 15, 2015 by Darren

The Heart of the Sea is well-made, and full of all manner of interesting dynamics and clever set-ups. Pitting man against nature is always a sure recipe for drama, and stranding a bunch of people in the middle of the ocean adds all sorts of unique tensions. Survival drama is powerful, resonating with key themes about man’s endurance and limitations. Putting a bunch of talented actors in boat together under the eye of a talented director will get you half-way to a good film.

The problem with The Heart of the Sea is that it lacks focus. It is a film that is never entire sure what it is about, or how it wants to be about it. Is it an environmentalist fable about mankind’s hubris and arrogance? Is it the tale of the lengths to which a man will do to survive? Is it a tale of two competing egos and the live entrusted to their care? Is it a secret history of Moby Dick, the great American novel? The answer is that The Heart of the Sea tries to be all of these things, but never quite consistently and never entirely thoroughly.

Good Whale Hunting.
(Courtesy of Niall Murphy.)

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: chris hemsworth, film, heart of the sea, Movie, non-review review, review, ron howard, the heart of the sea | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Daddy’s Home

Posted on December 14, 2015 by Darren

Daddy’s Home is fairly mediocre comedy, despite the promise. In some respects, the film recalls very successful Will Ferrell vehicles. The premise of the film is fairly solid, with father and step-father competing with one another for the love of their children; it loosely resembles a middle-aged version of the awkward immaturity that made Step-Brothers such fun. The film features the unlikely comedic team of Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg, two actors who had played very well off one another in The Other Guys.

The problem is simply one of calibration. Daddy’s Home struggles to pitch itself at the right level, never finding the right balance between sincere and cynical. It seems trite to complain that the protagonists of a modern comedy are unlikable or unsympathetic, but Daddy’s Home never feels like it finds an emotional core. This is not a fatal flaw of itself, but it becomes a problem when Daddy’s Home cannot supply a steady stream of laughs.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: comedy, daddy's home, film, mark wahlberg, Movie, non-review review, review, will ferrell | 2 Comments »

To 60 Seconds and Not Beyond: Closing Date Approaches for “Jameson Done in 60 Seconds” Competition

Posted on December 14, 2015 by Darren

To take part in this year’s Jameson Done in 60 Seconds competition and be in with a chance of winning an Empire Award and attending the star-studded Jameson Empire Awards in March 2016, simply choose a movie and distil it down to 60 seconds of cinematic essentials, just like putting all the best bits in a movie trailer. Then grab some mates, blag a camera (or smartphone) and upload your one minute masterpiece to www.jamesonempirediss.com before January 14^th 2016.

One Irish entry will be chosen by an expert panel of judges including six-time Oscar nominated director Jim Sheridan, actor and author Eoin Macken, who just finished filming the Hollywood blockbuster Resident Evil: The Final Chapter along with actor Kevin Ryan, who stars in the new ABC series Guilt which is due for release in 2016, to represent Ireland at the Global Jameson Done in 60 Seconds final in London.

Last year’s Jameson Done in 60 Seconds winner Oliver Jones impressed the judges with his hilariously low-fi take on Ghostbusters, he collected his award live on stage at the Jameson Empire Awards.

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Non-Review Review: The Night Before

Posted on December 2, 2015 by Darren

The Night Before does not always work well, but it works hard.

The tale of three unlikely best friends embarking on one final Christmas bender runs through the checklist of the modern “overgrown manchild” comedy genre elements. There is arrested development. There is adulthood beaconing. There is responsibility to be claimed. There is friendship to be fractured and ultimately strengthened. There is a great supporting cast and a number of very effectively employed cameos. All The Night Before does is to apply a layer of festive frosting atop a familiar recipe.

A star performance…?

The formula has been dulled somewhat by the frequency with which it has been deployed. A lot of The Night Before feels familiar and even rote. However, there are moments of absurd clarity. The Night Before puts a surprising amount of effort into some of its more effective gags, painstakingly setting up the pins so that they might be knocked down at a later date. In particular, one of the climactic gags is the result of a great deal of careful alignment over the preceding nineties minutes, a laugh that looks cheap but is as intricately crafted as a fancy tree ornament.

The Night Before is not the most hilarious or memorable or definitive of these sorts of Apatow-esque comedies, but there is an endearing effort to it all. There is never a sense of coasting, even at points where the film leans towards the nostalgia and arrested development that it spends so much effort trying to escape.

You take my elf…
You take my elf-control.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: anthony mackie, film, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Movie, non-review review, review, Seth Rogen, the night before | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: The Good Dinosaur

Posted on November 24, 2015 by Darren

It may have been too much to hope for two classic Pixar films in the space of a single calendar year.

The Good Dinosaur is generally quite solid, but it lacks the sense of narrative craft and emotional weight that marks the very best of Pixar’s output. As with Brave before it, there is a sense that The Good Dinosaur would have made for a fairly middling entry in the larger Disney canon. In terms of ranking the studio’s output, “the good Dinosaur” is perhaps a fairly apt label for the project. It is light-hearted and fun, but lacking any distinct sense of substance and identity.

Bad human! Bad!

The best thing about The Good Dinosaur is its core concept. At the heart of the story is a rather ingenious narrative hook. What if the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs… missed? What if that hunk of rock that came hurdling through space had come in at an angle just a couple of degrees off course? What if it were simply a shooting star passing through the sky one night rather than a full stop marking the end of the Cretaceous period or the Mesozoic era? That is a wonderful jumping-off point for an adventure, and The Good Dinosaur never quite measures up to that.

The Good Dinosaur is ultimately a buddy comedy road trip adventure about a young child who finds himself stranded far from home with an unlikely travelling companion. The result is an occasionally enjoyable, if not entirely satisfying, film.

I am dino, hear me roar!

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: disney, film, non-review review, pixar, review, the good dinosaur | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Christmas with the Coopers

Posted on November 23, 2015 by Darren

Christmas with the Coopers largely succeeds at what it sets out to do.

It is an affectionate ensemble dramedy that celebrates the eccentric and the surreal aspects of family units, whether those are families that were found or those that were thought lost. Christmas with the Coopers is part of a proud holiday ensemble tradition, a spiritual successor to New Year’s Day or Valentine’s Days, although it seems like any true Christmas ensemble piece must rest comfortably in the shadow of Love Actually. It seems unlikely that Christmas with the Coopers will become a new holiday favourite.

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Nevertheless, there is a charming efficiency to Christmas with the Coopers, with the movie accomplishing a lot of what it sets out to do. There is festive cheer a plenty, wry narration from Steve Martin, lots of mad dashing through convenient obstacles, affirmation, snow, and the warm realisation that family is what you make of it. There are very few surprises to be found, but then that is entirely the point. Christmas with the Coopers aims to be as reassuring and as familiar as any old-fashioned family holiday get together.

It largely succeeds.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: christmas with the coopers, film, Movie, non-review review | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: The Hunger Games – Mockingjay, Part II

Posted on November 17, 2015 by Darren

As with the rest of the series, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II has an admirable sense of ambition.

There some bold ideas here for a young adult series, some of which are increasingly relevant to twenty-first century political realities. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II feels like very old-school science-fiction, tackling big issues through metaphor and allegory. While the final film in the series is very much an action spectacular, the script offers any number of observations about terrorism and state power, about media and revolutionary politics. It is nice to see such a big-budget high-profile film tackling these ideas.

Straight arrow…

At the same time, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II feels a little too clean and tempered for its own good. The script is willing to engage with complicated questions of moral relativity, but the problems frequently feel superficial. The movie frequently suggests that political and military realities are not as clear-cut as they might appear, before offering a rather clear-cut solution to what was presented as a moral quagmire. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II does not follow the path of least resistance, but it follows the path of second-least resistance.

Oddly enough for a story that has been split across two films, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II feels rather incomplete and rushed in places. Certain sections of the expansive ensemble are casually brushed aside towards the end, with the film tying its major plot threads up quite hastily and efficiently. Still, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part II is impressively produced and anchored in a few great performances from a very experienced cast. The result is a smooth-running film that perhaps might have been better to embrace a few more bumps and hiccups.

As the world burns…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: film, katniss, media, modern warfare, non-review review, review, the hunger games, the hunger games: mockingjay, war | 6 Comments »

Jameson Cult Film Club: Ghostbusters

Posted on November 11, 2015 by Darren

They came. They saw. They kicked some ass.

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New York City was brought to Dublin as the Jameson Cult Film Club returned for a double screening of biblical proportions of the 1984 classic Ghostbusters on Wednesday 4th and Thursday 5th of November at the Mansion House.

The interactive Jameson Cult Film Club screenings are widely regarded as one of the most hotly anticipated cinematic events of the year and yet again organisers didn’t disappoint. Dublin’s Mansion House was completely transformed into a series of sets from the movie including the Ghostbusters’ NYC headquarters and Dana’s Central Park apartment.

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Iconic scenes from the movie, such as Dana’s capture by the Terror Dogs, were acted out throughout the screening by lookalike actors. In other scenes, the Ghostbusters ran through the audience in a bid to escape being slimed.

The crowd got a real surprise when the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man exploded on screen, with “melted marshmallow” pouring from the ceiling.

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These free events are more than just your typical screening, as characters from the movie, live theatre and special effects timed perfectly with on-screen action help to create an electric atmosphere throughout the screening.

Following the screening, the party continued in true Jameson style with DJ Aidan Kelly on decks. Guests enjoying the gourmet burgers and Jameson Ginger and Limes at the venue included actors Adam Weafer and Carl Shabaan, film director Kevin de la Isla O’Neill and RTE’s Stephen Byrne.

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For the uninitiated, Jameson Cult Film Club is all about watching your favourite cult films at spectacular screenings, staged to transport you into the film’s universe. This is a free event for movie fans, check out www.jamesoncultfilmclub.ie for details of upcoming screenings and register your details for the chance to win free tickets.

Filed under: Movies | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Spotlight

Posted on November 3, 2015 by Darren

Nominally, Spotlight is about the exposé that ran in the Boston Globe identifying dozens of paedophile priests who had been shuffled around Boston parishes and the corrupt institution that sheltered them. Thomas McCarthy’s film never shies away from the horror stories told by the survivors of such institutional abuse, nor does it ignore the systems that were complicit in perpetuating and covering up that abuse. Running just over two hours, McCarthy’s film is meticulous and painstaking as it sorts through all the leads and follows the unravelling thread.

However, Spotlight is also about something bigger. It is a story about institutional structures as they exist, and how those structures are primarily motivated to protect themselves. The big reveal in Spotlight is not that the abuse is taking place, it is just how many people tried in how many different ways to expose that abuse to the cold light of day. The Catholic Church might be the most significant institution involved in the cover-up, but Spotlight suggests that the structures of Boston (and implicitly all over the globe) failed the people who needed them most.

Spotlight is a powerful film. McCarthy is not the most dynamic or exciting of directors, but his matter-of-fact presentation style suits the material perfectly. Towards the end of the film, journalist Matt Carroll jokes that he has started working on a horror novel to distract himself from the particulars of the case. Spotlight is very much a horror story, but a horror story where the discomfort is tied to the sheer inevitability. McCarthy’s camera is always definite and steady; a slow pan or zoom confirms what the audience already suspects, and is all the more effective for it.

McCarthy has assembled a fantastic cast, including John Slattery as Ben Bradley Junior. Bradley is the son of Benjamin Bradley Senior, the executive editor at The Washington Post who oversaw the Watergate coverage and who was played by Jason Robards in All the President’s Men. This creates a nice thread of real-life continuity for Spotlight, cementing its pedigree. McCarthy’s journalism epic is powerful stuff, and perhaps the most compelling endorsement of long-form investigative journalism to appear on screen in quite some time.