film | the m0vie blog

Non-Review Review: The Hunger Games – Catching Fire

Posted on November 21, 2013 by Darren

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire suffers from a problem comic to the second story in planned trilogies. It lacks its own clear arc or structure, instead serving as a little more (or perhaps a little less) than half a film. There’s no conclusion or resolution here, just a lot dangling plot threads and insinuations – the suggestion of a larger and grander conflict looming on the horizon that might offer some measure of closure.

While it improves on quite a few flaws from the first film, it ultimately feels rather hollow; like an extended trailer for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay.

Hungry for more?

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: arts, Catching Fire, film, george lucas, Hunger, Hunger Game, Hunger Games, Hunger Games: Catching Fire, Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Katniss Everdeen, Mockingjay, Movies, Poverty | 11 Comments »

Non-Review Review: The Family

Posted on November 20, 2013 by Darren

I can’t tell you what The Family is. Not because of omerta or anything as cliché as that, but because it seems like The Family itself doesn’t know. I can describe what happens in the film, taking you through the events as they unfold on screen. I can describe the set-up. I can talk about its obvious influences. But I can’t tell you what exactly Luc Besson’s latest film actually is, because it seems like Besson himself can’t make up his mind.

Is it an action film with a quirky and unconventional set-up? Is it a gangster comedy about a former crook trying to go straight? Is it a fish-out-of-water comedy of manners about Americans arriving in northern France? Is it a pitch black comedy about a self-justifying sociopath attempting to carve out his own place in the world? Is it a high-stakes thriller about a family putting their lives on the line? Is it a weird coming-of-age drama? The Family is all of these things at various points, but it never commits to any of them.

Instead, it uses these elements to just keep circling until the running time is over.

Family values…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: arts, Besson, Dianna Agron, EuropaCorp, family, film, france, Gangster, luc besson, michelle pfeiffer, Movie, Robert De Niro, robert deniro, Soprano, United States | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Gravity

Posted on October 30, 2013 by Darren

Gravity is a phenomenal piece of filmmaking, and one of the highlights of the year. It’s a bold and visually stunning survival movie, built around the most simple of premises with incredible craftsmanship. It’s a lean and well-constructed thriller that manages to effortlessly capture the impossible isolation experienced by those flying in the void. Never over-wrought or over-strained, Gravity is an absolutely beautiful accomplishment for all involved.

Floating in a most peculiar way…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: 3d film, Alfonso Cuarón, film, Filmmaking, george clooney, Gravitation, Gravity, hollywood, Houston, Physics, Ryan, sandra bullock, Sound design, Space station | 12 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Enough Said

Posted on October 14, 2013 by Darren

Enough Said is a charming little romantic comedy starring Julia Louise-Dreyfuss as Eva. Eva is a divorced parent who finds herself in the relationship with another charming divorcée, navigating the difficulties of dating-after-marriage and trying to come to terms with her daughter’s impending departure to attend college. Through what another character describes as “an unbelievable coincidence”, our protagonist finds herself in a delightfully awkward romantic situation, trapped between two people very close to her.

Enough Said owes a debt to the classic romantic farce – the comedy of errors and manners – but the humour here is a lot more focused and character-driven. Once the plot becomes clear, it seems like Enough Said might devolve into a slapstick comedy about timing and awkward double entendres, but it’s to the credit of writer and director Nicole Holofcener that the film instead remains tightly focused on Eva and the people around her.

Stepping up…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Albert, Ben Falcone, Catherine Keener, Enough Said, Eva, film, Gandolfini, james gandolfini, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Nicole Holofcener, Relationships, Romantic comedy film, toni collette | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Barbaric Genius

Posted on October 8, 2013 by Darren

Barbaric Genius has a fascinating subject. Writer John Healy was responsible for The Grass Arena, generally regarded as one of the most searingly and brutally honest depictions of life on the streets published during the eighties. However, despite the fact that The Grass Arena became a touchstone for an entire generation and that it was so successful that it was developed into a film, Healy faded rather quickly from view. Despite writing consistently over the years that followed, none of Healy’s work was published for more than two decades following the 1988 release of The Grass Arena.

It’s an intriguing mystery, and Barbaric Genius does a thorough job exploring it, but the documentary suffers a bit as it tries to bring its subject into focus, often feeling like director/producer/narrator Paul Duane is having difficulty getting the necessary distance between himself and the film.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: art, arts, business, Documentary film, Duane, film, Grass Arena, Healy, history, John Healy, Movie, non-review review review, Paul Duane, review, The Grass Arena: An Autobiography | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: The Fifth Estate

Posted on October 4, 2013 by Darren

The ink is still fresh on The Fifth Estate, although perhaps that is too outdated a metaphor. The code is yet to be debugged might be more appropriate. History has yet to really decide what it will make of Julian Assange and Wikileaks. Cyber freedom fighters, the internet generation’s Woodward and Burnstein? Or reckless and disconnected kids failing to realise that writing on screen can have very real consequences? “Editing reflects bias,” we’re reminded early in the film, perhaps a concession that that the movie can’t get the necessary distance to offer a definitive (or even especially nuanced) take on Assange and his revolution.

The Fifth Estate comes down quite hard against Assange, essentially reducing Benedict Cumberbatch’s white-haired technological genius to something like a Bond villain. Director Bill Condon struggles to make typing code look sexy with laboured metaphors. And yet, despite that, there’s a willingness here to engage with something big and bold and important, however clumsily the script grapples with the implications of Wikileaks.

The result is something far more compelling that the dire Diana. Diana was a film so close to its subject that it couldn’t muster any enthusiasm or offer anything approaching a challenging opinion. The Fifth Estate is too close to its subject matter, and it clumsily stumbles into obvious bias and slant, but it’s still an intriguing attempt to parse a new media that it seems Hollywood doesn’t really understand.

He’s Assange one, that one…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Bill Condon, contemporary, film, Julian Assange, Movies, non-review review, review, the fifth estate, thriller politics, Wikileaks | 5 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Runner Runner

Posted on October 2, 2013 by Darren

Runner Runner feels like it should be a lot more fun than it winds up being. For a film about gambling, it lays the cards on the table pretty quickly. It’s a story about an ambitious young man who is offered wealth and success, only to eventually discover that the price is nothing less than his soul. As such, our plucky young hero has to keep all the plates spinning as the walls close in around him, trying to keep his head above water and the wolves from his door. There are, of course, other clichés I can throw in there, but these will do for now.

As such, Runner Runner isn’t about originality or insight, borrowing heavily from far better character studies and morality plays – even the casting of Justin Timberlake as a nerdy internet-savvy college student feels like a riff on his role in The Social Network. Runner Runner is all about the execution of these familiar high concepts and plot points. Unfortunately, the movie never seems too invested in its stakes, or too engaged with the game it is playing. When the chips are down, Runner Runner can nothing but fold.

I want to believe this is the same look Ben Affleck had when reading the internet’s response to Batffleck…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Affleck, ben affleck, Costa Rica, Federal Bureau of Investigation, film, Gambling, Gemma Arterton, Justin Timberlake, Online gambling, Runner Runner, Social Network, Timberlake, United States | 6 Comments »

Jameson Cult Film Club: Die Hard

Posted on September 20, 2013 by Darren

I had the pleasure of attending Wednesday evening’s Jameson Cult Film Club screening of Die Hard. As we’ve come to expect from the guys, it was a wonderful evening hosted in the Tivoli Theatre, from the black-and-white cop car waiting to greet us outside right down to the cut out copy the Nakatomi lobby sculpture, the team clearly put the usual amount of love and affection into crafting an immersive experience for the audience.

(My personal favourite moment was the decision to announce that the film would be starting shortly by having an Alan-Rickman look-alike and his goons storm the dance floor. It was a lovely touch, particularly given the decision to have the directions shouted by the gun-weilding goons rather than the Rickman impersonator.)

Photos and more after the jump.

Click to enlarge.

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: Action film, alan rickman, arts, cult film, cult movies, die hard, dublin, film, jameson cult film club, Karl, los angeles, Movie, Screening (medicine) | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Insidious – Chapter 2

Posted on September 11, 2013 by Darren

Horror sequels are tough to execute, particularly where you have a returning cast. After all, strong horror films typically work by ramping up the pressure on the central character, building inexorably towards a climax. It’s very hard to follow on from that – where do you go? It’s very difficult to wind the tension back down and start ramping up from scratch, and the same trick is never as effective the second time.

Insidious: Chapter 2 faces these challenges, and – to its credit – it tries to work around them. It embraces an almost camp aesthetic to help compensate for the fact that it effectively kicks off at maximum volume, relishing the sheer absurdity of its demonic co-stars. It splits the main cast up in order to allow it to try to maintain a constant sense of pressure, while also delving into back story and origin. It subtly shifts its frame of reference from movies about possession and haunting toward a different sort of horror film.

However, these attempts aren’t as successful as they might be. While there are moments of wit, the humour and heightened camp occasionally causes tonal confusion. Splitting the cast up is too convenient a narrative device and diffuses (rather than maintains) the tension. Slasher and serial killer movies are hard to get right at the best of times, and the movie’s climax feels awkward grafted on to a possession story. Insidious: Chapter 2 has moments where it works very well, but also spends a significant amount of its running time groping in the dark.

Well, at least it’s an amicable haunting…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: box office, Chapter (religion), film, Horror film, Insidious, James Wan, Leigh Whannell, Lin Shaye, patrick wilson, Scream 4, Trailer (promotion), Whannell | 4 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Riddick

Posted on September 1, 2013 by Darren

Riddick is remarkably candid about the trouble with The Chronicles of Riddick. “Somewhere,” Riddick tells us in his introductory monologue, “I lost my way.” The movie sees Riddick trying to get back to his roots – literally and figuratively. He abandons the trappings of The Chronicles of Riddick, casting Karl Urban aside after little more than a cameo and a convoluted back story. He longs to return home.And, in a way, he does.

Eschewing the scale of The Chronicles of Riddick, the movie finds Riddick and the crews of two ships locked in combat on the surface of a planet, discovering that the elements are against them – and the monsters hiding therein. The movie is acutely aware of how tightly it’s mirroring Pitch Black. At one point, before an alien onslaught begins, one co-star asks how many survivors emerged from the crash at the start of Pitch Black. “As many as are in this room,” Riddick replies, underscoring the similarities.

However, Riddick is strongest when it tries to recapture the mood of Pitch Black, rather than trying to connect more directly with its predecessors. The decision to hang the back story of the film on a minor character from a movie released a decade ago feels like a miscalculation, and the movie’s introduction suffers from an indecisiveness about whether it’s breaking free of or following on from its direct predecessor.