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Non-Review Review: Dragged Across Concrete

Posted on February 24, 2019 by Darren

This film was seen as part of the Virgin Media Dublin International Film Festival 2019. 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. This was the Surprise Film.

Dragged Across Concrete is weird, unpleasant, mean-spirited and vindictive.

It is all of these things in a very knowing manner. This both adds to and detracts from its attempts to get under its audience’s skin. There can be something charming in a provocateur who needles the audience in an interesting or compelling way, who pushes the audience outside of their comfort zone. However, there is also something very tiring in a filmmaker who is only doing that for the sake of pushing the audience outside their comfort zone. Call it the Jurassic Park paradox; just because something is possible does not mean it is valid or necessary.

Indeed, the most frustrating part of Dragged Across Concrete is how much time and energy it devotes to being frustrating without any greater purpose. It is a film that is very consciously designed to push certain buttons, but without any really sense of why it would want to. Dragged Across Concrete is a deeply frustrating piece of cinema, and that frustration is only deepened by a hefty two-hour-and-fifty minute runtime. Watching Dragged Across Concrete, it can be hard to tell whether that frustration is more or less pure for its clarity of purpose.

However, it is abundantly clear that it does not make for a good film.

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Non-Review Review: Ying (“Shadow”)

Posted on February 24, 2019 by Darren

Shadow is a mess.

Shadow aims for opera, but winds up in soap opera. The film’s plotting is a mess of internal contradictions grasping desperately at pseudo-profundity. The film’s structure is completely chaotic, with what should be the climax of the third act coming about a half-an-hour before the end credits in order to make room for even more plot twists and betrayals and reversals. Shadow simply does not work on a number of fundamental levels.

And yet, in spite of that, there’s an incredible charm to the film. Director Zhang Yimou commits wholeheartedly and unquestioningly to his premise, right down to the heavily desaturated-to-the-point-of-almost-being-black-and-white colour scheme. Shadow never seems to have any hesitation or self-doubt as it commits to an increasingly convoluted plot and a series of increasingly absurd visual flourishes. It is as exhilarating as it is infuriating.

Shadow is a movie in which an invading army cocks their razor umbrellas before riding said umbrellas through the streets of a city under assault. It’s completely off the wall, but also impossible to completely resist.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: China, film, Movie, non-review review, review, Shadow, ying, zhang yimou | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Wilkolak (“Werewolf”)

Posted on February 24, 2019 by Darren

Werewolf is pretty solid “Nazisploitation”, those sorts of genre (usually horror) pieces that play off the imagery and reality of the Second World War.

Werewolf is certainly stronger than other recent examples of the genre, such as Overlord. Focusing on a group of children Holocaust survivors who find themselves menaced by a pack of feral dogs from the camp, Werewolf is a story about trauma, violence and victimhood. It is a film about how these things self-perpetuate, and how these cycles of abuse need to be broken. Writer and director Adrian Panek frames this story through the lens of horror.

This certainly makes sense. The Second World War and the Holocaust were a trauma on a global scale, but most obviously on the European continent. The concentration camps were build outside of Germany, spreading the horror across the region. Poland was home to six extermination camps, something that leaves an indelible mark on a region. Werewolf navigates this trauma through familiar horror movie staples; the orphans in the gothic mansion, the haunted woods, the allegorical monster, the group that threatens to fracture and fray under pressure.

The only real problem with Werewolf is that it’s simply not scary enough to work as a horror movie.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: dogs, holocaust, Movie, nazisploitation, non-review review, polish film, review, second world war, trauma, wehrwolf, werewolf | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: A Girl From Mogadishu

Posted on February 24, 2019 by Darren

One of the most striking aspects of discussing a biographical film is separating the biography from the film.

Ifrah Ahmed is a truly spectacular human being, with a truly incredible story. More than that, Ahmed is a hugely influential figure who has done an impressive amount of work to draw public attention to a very important cause. Ahmed is an inspiring figure, and very much worthy of all the praise and publicity that she has received. Her advocacy for women affected by female genital mutilation is a cause that merits support and encouragement. More than that, there is probably a great movie to be made about Ahmed’s story.

Unfortunately, A Girl From Mogadishu is not that story. The film is a disaster on a spectacular scale. The issue is certain not its choice of subject or subject matter; in the hands of a competent production team, those two elements could combine to create a truly engaging and exciting piece of film. The problem with A Girl From Mogadishu is the sheer level of creative incompetence involved. This is a film that often seems like it was assembled by a director who had only ever heard films described, rather than actually watched any of them.

A Girl From Mogadishu is cinematically illiterate, which is massively disappointing on a number of level. It betrays a talented international cast, an audience hungry for good stories told well, and a subject who is arguably one of the most important Irish social figures of the past decade and who very much deserves a much better spotlight.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: A Girl From Mogadishu, film, Movie, non-review review, review | 6 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Rafiki

Posted on February 22, 2019 by Darren

Rafiki is a sweet and tender love story, and well worth seeking out.

Writer and director Wanuri Kahiu is part of an artistic movement that brands itself “Afrobubblegum.” A collective of artists working together to redefine what Africa looks and feels like on screen, the “Afrobubblegum” movement is dedicated to breaking away from many of the clichés and conventions associated with continent to provide a much broader perspective of twenty-first century Africe. Rafiki is very much a part of that movement. It is a story of teen love, of the simmering attraction between two young women on the cusp of adulthood within a reactionary society that would crush such love underneath its heel. It’s a familiar set-up, evoking any number of coming-of-age same-sex love stories, the obvious (and perhaps lazy) comparison being Moonlight.

Rafiki is a fairly conventional narrative in these in terms. Indeed, the audience has a fairly good idea of where the film is going from the opening scenes that establish the realities with which Kena lives before also suggesting her strong attraction to Ziki. However, Rafiki is elevated by a number of factors. Most obviously, there are the winsome performances from young leads Samantha Mugatsia and Sheila Munyiva, who bring a very naturalistic vulnerability to their roles. However, there’s also the sheer charm of the script and the direction, which beautifully captures the feeling of young love from moment to moment, without recourse to exposition or purple prose or heavy-handed soliloquies. Rafiki feels like a movie that knows love, in a very personal and intimate way.

Rafiki is perhaps a little unpolished around the edges, but works well where it matters. It is a movie that understands the trepidation, the excitement, the longing, the fear, the passion, and the power of what it is to want another person, even (and especially) when there are so many reasons not to. There is a simple and convincing beauty in that.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: afrobubblegum, film, kenya, Movie, non-review review, rafiki, review, Wanuri Kahiu | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Her Smell

Posted on February 22, 2019 by Darren

Put frankly, Her Smell stinks.

To be fair, there’s some interesting material here. film has long been obsessed with stories about fame and celebrity, particularly when filtered through the lens of tragedy and recovery. After all, A Star is Born roared to life as the early frontrunner in this year’s awards race, while Vox Lux provided a darker and weirder meditation on similar themes. Her Smell is very much a companion piece to these other films, a meditation on what fame does to a person, how strange it is. Her Smell is the story of a washed up punk rocker who inevitably collides with rock bottom, and yet somehow finds a way to keep going despite (or perhaps because of) the love of the people around her.

It is interesting to note that “Becky She” hits rock bottom and just keeps going, because this feels like an adequate assessment of Her Smell. Alex Ross Perry’s latest film is two hours and fifteen minutes long, and feels every single one of them. The movie has one single point that it keeps hammering again and again and again, one particular rhythm that it keeps playing again and again and again. Scenes within the film are interminable of themselves, but somehow repeated again and again and again. However, this shallow repetition is not the biggest problem with Her Smell, it’s the combination of that shallow repetition with a smug satisfaction, the cocky assuredness that underscores every single moment.

Her Smell is a dull and lifeless movie convinced of (and insistent upon) its own profundity. Roger Ebert famously argued that no good movie is too long and no bad movie is too short. One could cut two hours from Her Smell and it would still be fifteen minutes too long.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: alex ross perry, dublin international film festival, elizabeth moss, film, her smell, Movie, non-review review, punk rock, review, virgin media dublin international film festival | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Papi Chulo

Posted on February 21, 2019 by Darren

Papi Chulo has a very narrow line to walk.

At its core, Papi Chulo is a very old-fashioned opposites-ultimately-attract buddy comedy. In keeping with the conventions of the genre, the central duo crosses racial and class divides. It is the story of a burnt-out Los Angeles weatherman who hires a Mexican day labourer to (ostensibly) paint his patio deck. Despite the fact that the two are from very different worlds and literally speak different languages, an unlikely bond develops between the two. This is a fairly standard set-up, and an old feel-good Hollywood standard. Indeed, Green Book employed the formula to considerable awards-season success, demonstrating that the template endures.

Peak happiness.

As such, Papi Chulo comes a fascinating premise, but a loaded one. Indeed, the Green Book comparison is something of a double-edged sword. The decision to position an immigrant day labourer as one half of the mismatched couple at the centre of Papi Chulo gives the movie a lot of political weight in the current cultural climate. It would be impossible for a movie about an unlikely friendship between a white man and a Mexican in modern California that crosses class divides not to resonate with everything else happening in the world around it. In fact, given the popularity of this sort of template for exploring issues of race and class in America, it is surprising that there have been so few movies along these lines. It is also surprising that this movie comes from an Irish director.

To be fair to Papi Chulo, the movie always seems aware of how deeply awkward it is for a rich white person to hire a day labourer to (in effect) be his friend. That power imbalance and privilege is always lurking off-screen, and the film is never particularly ambiguous in its assessment of Sean’s behaviour; the weatherman is not working through his issues in a healthy way, but imposing himself on Ernesto. However, these issues never come to the fore, and are only fleetingly acknowledged over the course of the film. This works well enough when the film can count on the unlikely chemistry between Matt Bomer and Alejandro Patino to carry the first half of the film, but it doesn’t really work when the film makes a conscious choice to separate the duo in the second half.

Snap chat.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: dublin international film festival, film, John Butler, matt bomer, Movie, non-review review, papi chulo, review, virgin media dublin international film festival | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Isn’t It Romantic?

Posted on February 20, 2019 by Darren

Isn’t It Romantic? is a movie that seriously misjudges its own premise.

At the heart of Isn’t It Romantic? is a fairly solid observation. The conventional romantic comedy has seen better days. The genre enjoyed a boom in the nineties, largely driven by the star power and charisma of actors like Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. It is no surprise that Isn’t It Romantic? opens with the familiar chords of Roy Orbinson’s Pretty Woman and then cuts to a childhood memory of the lead character watching Pretty Woman. In recent years, the genre has gradually been squeezed out of cinemas. It is no longer the cultural force that it once was, with a handful of notable exceptions. Isn’t It Romantic? positions itself as part of a larger discussion about the state of the genre.

He will, in fact, take you to the candy shop.

However, Isn’t It Romantic? approaches this issue in a very strange way. Typically, genres that have been marginalised or pushed to the fringes respond with a level of introspection and analysis; think of Unforgiven with westerns or even Cabin in the Woods with schlocky teen horrors. The idea is that the genre can take itself apart and put itself back together. On the surface, Isn’t It Romantic? seems to be positioning itself as this sort of movie. Indeed, a significant portion of the movie’s stretch of set-up is given over to an extended sequence of the lead character working through the tropes and rhythms of, and the problems with, the romantic comedy genre in almost excruciating detail. Isn’t It Romantic? seems to position itself as an autopsy.

However, it very quickly becomes clear that beyond pointing out these tropes, Isn’t It Romantic? has very little interesting to actually say about them. If the film genuinely believes that the genre is dead, then Isn’t It Romantic? opens as a public autopsy before morphing into a strange act of cinematic necrophilia.

The best laid plans.

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Non-Review Review: The Hole in the Ground

Posted on February 19, 2019 by Darren

Reduced to a snappy elevator pitch, The Hole in the Ground is perhaps best described as “Without Name by way of The Babadook with a dash of The Descent for flavour.”

Such descriptions are inevitably reductive, and don’t do justice to Lee Cronin’s maternal pagan wilderness horror, but they provide a strong sense of texture for the film. Indeed, given the quality of the three horror movies cited, The Hole in the Ground is at least drawing from the best sort of sources. The Hole in the Ground is a horror movie that draws upon Ireland’s rich supernatural framework to deliver a more relatable and universal sort of horror. The Hole in the Ground is a tale about the parental anxiety about the bond between mother and child informed by a heritage of faeries and changelings. It’s very shrewdly constructed so that one set of primal fears resonates with another quintessentially human fear.

Curtains for you.

The Hole in the Ground is a canny and well-constructed horror. It is effectively directed by Cronin, who knows how to build suspense and dread. It understands the power of something as simple as close-ups and sound effects to create a feeling of repulsion in an audience, even confronted with a seemingly mundane activity; if not for The Killing of a Secret Deer, this film would have cornered the market on the visceral horror of eating spaghetti. Cronin’s ability to build suspense carries the film through to its logical conclusion, culminating in the relatively rare horror movie third act that feels confident, effective and ambitious. It helps that Cronin has actor Seana Kerslake in a lead role as well, effectively tasked with carrying much of the film singlehandedly.

The Hole in the Ground is well made and efficient. Its biggest issue is that it often feels assembled from left-over parts, that it is playing with clusters of ideas that have already been thorough and substantively explored by films with an even tighter focus. This isn’t a fatal flaw by any means; the horror films that The Hole in the Ground evokes are some of the finest of the twenty-first century. The Hole in the Ground isn’t quite competing at that level, but it is stille very, very good.

You must be kidding.

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New Podcast! Scannain Podcast (2019) #6!

Posted on February 17, 2019 by Darren

It’s time for the latest Scannain podcast!

This week, I join Ronan Doyle, Jay Coyle and Luke Dunne from Film in Dublin to discuss the week in film news. We have a broad and wide-ranging discussion of what we watched, asking tough questions like whether Flash Gordon really is the horniest movie ever made and ruminating on the visual power of Shrek Retold. There are also discussions of The Miseducation of Cameron Post and the thirties thriller Red Dust.

News-wise, awards season continues apace with the race settling down after the BAFTAs and Roma emerging as the frontrunner. Simultaneously, the Oscars continue to be struggle to get their show organised. Meanwhile, closer to home, the Irish Film Institute unveils its plans for 2019 and its evening course in British cinema since the eighties.

The top ten: