Movies | the m0vie blog

Non-Review Review: The Sparks Brothers

Posted on July 27, 2021 by Darren

The Sparks Brothers is a fan’s love letter. As the tagline helpfully summarises, it is a documentary about “your favourite band’s favourite band.”

Virtually everybody who appears on camera in The Sparks Brothers appears to rave about the eponymous siblings, Russ and Ron Mael, whose career has spanned more than half a century. There is a lot of joy and enthusiasm on display, even within fairly standard talking head sequences. Mike Myers takes a moment to playfully joke about how carefully the documentary team is getting is mole in focus, while the only character who has anything particularly negative or dismissive of the band is an animated Neil Tennant in a recollection from one of the band’s long-term associates.

An interesting framing…

This makes sense. The Sparks Brothers is a documentary from director Edgar Wright, a self-acknowledged fan of the band. Wright is careful never to crowd out or overwhelm his subjects, but he also takes advantage of his position as director to indulge his own fannish enthusiasm for the unlikely pop group. The Sparks Brothers is a surprisingly long documentary, running to two hours and twenty minutes. At least part of this is down to the fact that Wright takes great care to ensure that absolutely everybody gets a chance to have their say on what makes this “unusual duo from the seventies” such a monument

The Sparks Brothers is indulgent to a fault, but it’s also enthusiastic and excited. The energy of the assembled panel radiates through the screen, giving the documentary an infectious joie de vivre. The result is perhaps a little overlong and a little hagiological, but it is carried by a genuine sense of overdue celebration.

Oh, brother!

Continue reading →

Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: brothers, documentary, edgar wright, film, Movie, non-review review, review, ron mael, russ mael, sparks, the sparks brothers | 3 Comments »

New Escapist Video! On How “Black Widow” Demonstrates the MCU’s Humour Problem…

Posted on July 27, 2021 by Darren

So, as I have mentioned before, I am launching a new video series as a companion piece to In the Frame at The Escapist. The video will typically launch with every second Monday’s article, and be released on the magazine’s YouTube channel the following week. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.

With the release of Black Widow earlier in the month, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the film. In particular, the use of humour in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in general and in Black Widow in particular. In its best moments, the Marvel Cinematic Universe uses humour to enrich and deepen its themes. However, in Black Widow, it undermines them.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: agency, black widow, comedy, humour, improv, in the frame, jokes, natasha, omar ahmed, the escapist, video | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Promise and Peril of “Dune: Part One”…

Posted on July 26, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. Last week, footage from the upcoming Dune adaptation was filmed for critics and press to build attention. One of the more interesting revelations from these screenings was that the movie apparently comes with subtitle Dune: Part One.

On one level, this is not really a surprise. It was been reported for years now that the upcoming adaptation would only cover a certain amount of the source novel. However, there is a certain boldness to including a “part one” subtitle on the cinematic release. In one sense, it harks back to the trend in the 2010s of splitting popular books into multi-part adaptations. However, it also suggests the blurring of boundaries between media, implying that this is really the first part of a two-part miniseries, where the production of a second part is contingent upon the commercial performance of the first.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: dune, dune: part one, films, harry potter, in the frame, Movies, the escapist, twilight | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “Black Widow” and the MCU’s Humour Problem…

Posted on July 19, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Black Widow last weekend, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at one of the film’s biggest issues and one of the biggest issues with the MCU in general: the question of tone.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is funny. It has always been funny. This is part of what distinguished it from a lot of its comic book movie contemporaries when it was released. However, as the universe has progressed and evolved, the “house style” has tended towards ironic and self-aware punchlines. Sometimes this approach works beautifully; many of the best Marvel Studios films are also the funniest. However, it can also serve as a distraction that lowers the dramatic stakes and undermines key character beats.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: black widow, comic books, dramatic, escapist magazine, humour, in the frame, jokes, Marvel Cinematic Universe, punchlines, stakes, the escapist, video | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Video! “Space Jam: A New Legacy – Review”

Posted on July 16, 2021 by Darren

I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute film review of Space Jam: A New Legacy, which is releasing theatrically and on HBO Max this weekend.

Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: a new legacy, HBO Max, review, space jam, space jam: a new legacy, the escapist | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Fear Street Part Three – 1666

Posted on July 16, 2021 by Darren

If Fear Street Part One – 1994 and Fear Street Part Two – 1978 didn’t make it clear enough, Fear Street Part Three – 1666 confirms that the trilogy is more of a miniseries than a set of films.

To be fair, this was quite clear from the outset. The films feature a large branching cast, with many actors carrying over from one installment to another. The continuity between the individual films is so tight that the two later installments each open with an extended “previously on…” segment. Fear Street Part Three – 1666 carries this idea to its logical conclusion, effectively functioning as a two-part season finale. It opens with an hour set in the past and then jumps forward for a forty-minute coda designed to close the book (if not literally) on the events from Fear Street Part One – 1994.

A sight for sore (or missing) eyes…

There’s not necessarily anything wrong with this. After all, there’s arguably not a huge difference between the structure of these three films and something like the Red Riding trilogy. More to the point, it demonstrates how porous the gap between various media has become. Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, the highest grossing movie of 2020, is really just a six-episode bridging arc between two seasons of the manga. Hamilton is both one of the best movies of all-time according to the Internet Movie Database and an Emmy nominee. Even the Marvel Cinematic Universe is arguably as much television as cinema.

As such, it’s hard to judge Fear Street Part Three – 1666 entirely on its own merits.

Tying it all up.

Continue reading →

Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: fear street, fear street 1666, fear street part two, film, horror, Movie, netflix, non-review review, review, slasher | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Space Jam – A New Legacy

Posted on July 14, 2021 by Darren

Space Jam: A New Legacy is content to be content.

Continue reading →

Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: AT&T, basketball, bugs bunny, Content, hbo, HBO Max, intellectual property, ip, lebron james, looney tunes, non-review review, review, space jam, space jam: a new legacy, streaming | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Video! On How “Aliens” Responds to “Alien”…

Posted on July 13, 2021 by Darren

This month, with Aliens celebrating its thirty-fifth anniversary, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the film. In particular, how James Cameron designed one of the great sequels by refusing to simply repeat what worked about the original Alien. Instead, Aliens works in large part because it actively responds to and engages with Alien, in a way that enriches both films.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: alien, aliens, escapist, feminism, gender roles, james cameron, motherhood, omar ahmed, stereotypes, the escapist, video | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Escapist Movie Podcast – “Will Black Widow Have Us Russian Back to Cinemas?”

Posted on July 13, 2021 by Darren

The Escapist have launched a movie podcast, and I was thrilled to join Jack Packard and Richard Newby for the twenty-first episode of the year. With the release of Black Widow on streaming and in cinemas, there was only one movie to discuss. So we went for a deep dive into Marvel’s interquel, its character-centric movie for a dead Avenger.

You can listen to back episodes of the podcast here, click the link below or even listen directly.

Filed under: Movies, Podcasts! | Tagged: agency, black widow, box office, comedy, feminism, films, humour, jack packard, Marvel Cinematic Universe, mcu, Movies, podcast, prequels, richard newby, the escapist movie podcast | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On What “Demon Slayer: Mugen Train” Bodes for the Future of Anime…

Posted on July 12, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. It seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, which is both the highest grossing movie of 2020 at the global box office and the highest grossing film of all-time at the Japanese box office.

The success of Demon Slayer: Mugen Train is striking, because it is a very different sort of anime movie than the kind that normally breaks out. The Japanese box office has traditionally been dominated by anime films like Your Name, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Howl’s Moving Castle and others. The anime films that have typically broken out global are movies like Akira or Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion. These are all films with a very strong artistic viewpoint and a very consciously artisanal approach to storytelling.

In contrast, Demon Slayer: Mugen Train is a much more conventional sort of blockbuster in a much more modern style. It is a film written by a group credited under the corporate brand “Ufotable” and adapted from a manga written by an unknown author. It picks up directly from a television series, serving as a bridge between two seasons, with little attempt to orient casual viewers as to the character or plot. It is difficult to discern what exactly Demon Slayer: Mugen Train is saying about the world or even just about Japan, except for the broadest sorts of platitudes about duty and service.

Demon Slayer: Mugen Train feels like a cultural shift, representing a transition within Japanese popular animation that arguably just reflects broader shifts within global culture over the past decade or so. You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.