Movies | the m0vie blog

New Escapist Column! On the New Films Available Early on Streaming…

Posted on March 22, 2020 by Darren

I published a new Don’t Miss It piece at Escapist Magazine this evening

Basically, with the shutdown of theatres, a lot of content is landing on digital streaming services very quickly. It can be hard to keep track of it all, so we thought we’d throw together a quick round-up of the headlines, drawing attention to films like Just Mercy, The Way Back, Birds of Prey, Emma., The Hunt, The Invisible Man and more that will be available straight to your television set in the next couple of days.

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

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: corona virus, covid-19, digital, films, future, Movies, streaming | Leave a comment »

New at The Sunday Independent! An Idiot’s Guide to Screening…

Posted on March 22, 2020 by Darren

In one of those rare “I feel like a real journalist!” moments, I was asked to write a little piece at The Sunday Independent about streaming.

The film critics at The Sunday Independent, the wonderful Áine O’Connor and the sensational Hilary A. White, have put together a guide of what to watch on various streaming services. There’s a lot of really great material there, but there’s also a sense that this might be a new frontier for a lot of older readers used to physical media. So I put together a quick guide to service providers anf mechanics, and demonstrating what is available and how in terms of getting that streaming movie from your phone or laptop to your own big screen set-up.

It was great to be asked, and hopefully provide something of a useful public service in these turbulent times. You can read the article (and get those recommendations) here. Incidentally, I’ll be having a guide to some of the new releases available to stream early going up at The Escapist later on this evening.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: digital, quarantine, self-isolating, streaming, the sunday independent | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On COVID-19 and a Globalised Film Industry…

Posted on March 16, 2020 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at Escapist Magazine last week. Ironically, it’s probably already well out of date.

In the time since the article was published last Monday, the COVID-19 pandemic has only escalated further. Movie and television studios have halted production and distribution of various major titles. However, all of this illustrated how incredibly globalised the modern film industry truly is, both in the stories that we tell and the manner in which we are telling them. These are films that rely on global audiences, and so an outbreak in Japan and China has major repercussions within Hollywood itself.

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

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: covid-19, escapist magazine, no time to die | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the “The Hunt” as Empty Provocation…

Posted on March 15, 2020 by Darren

I published a new piece at Escapist Magazine last week. This is one has been a while in the making, since at least August last year.

The Hunt was massive controversial before anybody had actually watched the finished cut of the film. It attracted the ire of Fox News and, through that, Donald Trump. Universal pushed the film back, eventually settling on a mid-March release date, with the advertising leaning heavily into that controversy as a selling point. As such, it’s impossible to discuss The Hunt without discussing the maelstrom around it. This means that the movie itself feels like a disappointment and a damp squib. Its potent political content is nothing more than empty provocation, its biting social commentary just an elaborate troll. The Hunt has nothing to say, which is particularly disappointing as it is sandwiched between the genuinely political provocations of The Invisible Man and Promising Young Woman.

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

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: donald trump, escapist magazine, film, politics, provocation, the hunt | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Narrative Patching of “The Rise of Skywalker”…

Posted on March 14, 2020 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at Escapist Magazine yesterday evening. This is one is a bit topical, the constant narrative patching of Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker.

The Rise of Skywalker was released to something of a collective sigh. It was a spectacular mess of film, one full of dangling plot threads, unnecessary revelations and mountains of fan service. However, that messiness left a number of awkward lacunas, that were gradually filled in with supplemental material that revealed the nature of Lando’s arc and the identity of Rey’s father. All of this stuff radically alters the experience and understanding of The Rise of Skywalker, and the decision to strip that stuff out of the film itself illustrates how horrific the production process truly was. The awkward efforts to shoehorn this stuff back in are arguably comparable to the day-one patching of Cats to cover terrible special effects. This is not a flattering comparison.

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

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: escapist, skywalker, star wars, the rise of skywalker | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Misbehaviour

Posted on March 13, 2020 by Darren

Misbehaviour is a charming an engaging film that suffers slightly from the lack of a clear focal point.

Philippa Lowthorpe’s historical drama-comedy is set against the backdrop of the 1970 Miss World pageant in London. The event became something of a point of convergence in the cultural wars spilling over from the end of the sixties, a target for the anarchist fringe, the anti-apartheid campaign, and for the nascent women’s liberation movement. At the same time, a quieter revolution was taking place within the event itself. Grenada had sent its first contestant to take part, while South Africa sent a black woman to represent them for the first time.

Misbehaviour features an incredibly stacked cast and diverse array of perspectives, looking at the central event through a variety of radically different prisms. There’s a sense that Misbehaviour wants to offer a genuinely intersectional perspective on the events of that explosive contest, the film’s form resembling its core themes. It helps that Lowthorpe has assembled an increidbly charming cast, and that spending time with just about any member of the ensemble is a worthwhile endeavour of itself.

At the same time, though, the film struggles to balance its large ensemble. There are occasionally too many plates spinning, and too much space between them. By the time that the film has checked in on all the major characters and circled back around, dramatic momentum has been lost and the film has to spend a minute or two regaining its footing. As a result, Misbehaviour never works as well as it might, feeling a little too clumsy and broad. Still, there’s a lot to like about it.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: feminism, misbehaviour, miss world, miss world 1970, non-review review, review, revolution | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: The Hunt

Posted on March 11, 2020 by Darren

The Hunt could never live up to the controversy.

After all, The Hunt was a film that attracted a considerable deal of attention. The basic premise of the movie finds a number of “deplorables” kidnapped and taken to a secret location, where wealthy liberals hunt them for sport. This premise attracted the attention of Fox News back in August. From there, it attracted the attention of the President of the United States. Donald Trump tweeted angrily about The Hunt, and within a day it was pulled from the release calendar.

The Hunt arrives in cinemas cresting that wave of controversy. The trailer for the new release date openly acknowledges the controversy and leans into it, encouraging prospective audience members to “decide for [themselves]” about it. So The Hunt arrives as an object of curiosity and fascination. Unfortunately, none of that feels earned. Indeed, it looks like the most remarkable thing about the shift in release dates was that it allowed The Hunt to avoid a direct class with the similar-but-superior “elites riff on The Most Dangerous Game” film Ready or Not.

The Hunt goes looking for controversy, but comes home empty handed.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: craig zobel, damon lindelof, film, Movie, nick cuse, non-review review, review, the hunt | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Calm With Horses

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Darren

This film was seen as part of the Virgin Media Dublin International Film Festival 2020. Given the high volumes of films being shown and the number of reviews to be written, these may end up being a bit shorter than usual reviews.

Calm With Horses is a solid, atmospheric crime drama.

There are very few surprises in Nick Rowland’s West of Ireland gangster film. The plot is fairly straightforward, focusing on a muscle-bound enforced for a local crime family who finds himself torn between the man that he wants to be and the tool that his employers see him to be. There are familiar dreams of escape, and those inevitable consequences that ripple outwards from a single morally-justified-but-strategically-stupid decision towards inevitable disaster. Thematically, Calm With Horses belongs to that familiar genre of violent men trying to live with their violence. Even the metaphors are familiar.

That said, Calm With Horses benefits from strong execution. The film received funding as part of the WRAP initiative, encouraging film production on the western coast of the island. Rowland skillfully leverages the film’s location work in Clare and Galway, providing his moody character study with a rich sense of atmosphere. In its strongest moments, Calm With Horses taps into a lingering melancholy that suggests a desolation extending beyond the rugged rural landscapes. There is a sense that these characters are as stark and haunted as the landscapes that they wander.

Calm With Horses doesn’t really offer any new twists on a familiar genre, but elevates its familiar trappings through the execution.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: barry keoghan, calm with horses, cosmo jarvis, film, gangster film, Movie, non-review review, review | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Promising Young Woman

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Darren

Promising Young Woman is a deeply uncomfortable watch. As it should be.

The basic premise of Emerald Fennell’s theatrical debut is decidedly thorny. Cassandra is a thirty-year-old woman who spends her weekends going to bars and acting so drunk that she can barely stand. Inevitably, a “nice guy” arrives to volunteer to help. He usually bundles her into the back of a taxi and takes her back to his place. Then, things get very uncomfortable – particularly when they realise that Cassandra is nowhere near as incapacitated as she appears to be. It’s a hell of a hook.

Promising Young Woman is the kind of film that is going to generate lots and lots of “discourse.” It will stoke strong opinions. It will spark uncomfortable conversations. It is an incredibly loaded film. All of this makes Fennell’s accomplishment all the more impressive. Promising Young Woman is a remarkably confident and assured debut feature, a film which navigates an almost impossibly fraught subject with a surprising amount of charm and wit. Promising Young Woman is heartbreaking and hilarious, raw and riotous, often pivoting between extremes in the space of a single scene. It’s a deft balancing act.

However, the most remarkable thing about Promising Young Woman isn’t just the way that Fennell manages all these tensions within the film. Promising Young Woman manages to create a palpable and compelling tension with the audience – a perfectly calibrated push-and-pull that knows exactly which buttons to push and when, for maximum effect. Promising Young Woman is a film that challenges its audience as much as its characters, and that is what makes it such a striking piece of film-making.

Note: It is probably best to see Promising Young Woman as blind as possible, without any real foreknowledge of what the film is doing or how it does it. This review will not go into too much depth, but discussing the film means discussing some of those mechanics. Consider this a light spoiler warning, and an unqualified recommendation.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: audience, bo burnham, Carey Mulligan, emerald fennell, film, Movie, non-review review, promising young woman, r eview, rape, rape revenge, sympathy, tension | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Ewoks as Quintessential “Star Wars”…

Posted on March 6, 2020 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at Escapist Magazine this evening. This is one I’ve been thinking about for quite a while: the Ewoks.

Conventional fan wisdom is that the Ewoks are crap. After all, they don’t even get a look in when Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker returns to the ruins of the Death Star, ending up consigned to a brief cameo in the closing montage. There’s a certain strand of fandom that considers the Ewoks the weakest part of Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi. This is a shame, as the Ewoks are actually one of the best parts of the film. More than that, they are on of the best parts of the franchise. They speak to the kind of things that only Star Wars could do, that gonzo blend of wholesome and radical.

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