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Non-Review Review: Booksmart

Posted on May 8, 2019 by Darren

Booksmart has charm to burn.

Olivia Wilde’s feature length directorial debut is built from a familiar high school coming-of-age template. It is the story of two kids who just want to party before graduation and before heading their separate ways. There are any number of films built outward from that premise, or even core components of that premise. Booksmart is canny enough to understand the genre in which it is working. Indeed, the casting of Beanie Feldstein seems designed to directing invoke two key touchstones; Feldstein’s most notable role to date remains her supporting role in Lady Bird, and her brother Jonah Hill launched his career (in part) off the success of Superbad.

Partying is such sweet sorrow.

As with any movie in a familiar genre, the success Booksmart hinges on the execution more than the concept. There are dozens of films riffing on similar ideas, so Booksmart needs to distinguish itself in how it approaches the material in question. The film elevates this somewhat stock premise through the use of a charming cast and surprising emotional earnestness. It helps that the comedy driving the film is both very well-observed on its own terms and tends towards the affectionate rather than the mean-spirited. There’s an affectionate humanism in Booksmart, and the recurring suggestion that characters are more than just the roles that they play in the highly performative environment of high school.

However, it is the two leads that truly elevate Booksmart, working with a sharp script and confident direction to create an engaging and endearing portrait of teenage insecurities.

Hold on!

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: beanie feldstein, booksmart, film, kaitlyn dever, Movie, non-review review, review | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Float Like a Butterfly

Posted on May 7, 2019 by Darren

Unlike its protagonist, Float Like a Butterfly never quite figures out what it wants to be.

Float Like a Butterfly finds itself trapped between two different genres. On one side, Float Like a Butterfly aims for gritty social realism, charting a Traveller family as they attempt to navigate the uncaring Ireland of the early seventies. This is a familiar and naturalistic coming of age story, focusing on young Frances as she tries to hold her family together while her recently released father Michael sinks deeper and deeper into a drunken stupor. Frances is caught between the conservative patriarchal ideals of her own community, and the predatory hatred of the outside community.

The haymaker.

On the other hand, Float Like a Butterfly tries to position itself as an empowering sports movie, the familiar template about a confused and alienated young person who finds meaning and purpose through the expression that sport offers. Inspired by none other than Mohammad Ali himself, Frances aspires to become “the greatest.” She takes up boxing, even inheriting a set of gloves at one point. This is a story about a woman who is pressed in by a conservative society, but who finds a necessary outlet through sport. It is a feel-good triumphant narrative.

To its credit, Float Like a Butterfly plays both sides of this narrative relatively well; it offers a compelling portrait of life on the margins when it aims for naturalism, and delivers the feeling of empowerment and elation when it evokes those upbeat sports films. The big problem with Float Like a Butterfly is that it never reconciles these two competing halves into a single cohesive film. It is too meandering and too grounded to really sell itself as a sports narrative, but too heightened and too structured in its familiar plot rhythms to work as a slice of life.

Winning ribbons.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: carmel winters, film, Movie, non-review review, racism, review, sexism, travelling community | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Wine Country

Posted on May 7, 2019 by Darren

Wine Country should be a slam dunk.

The appeal Wine Country lies in its central cast. Wine Country assembles an impressive selection of older female comedians and drops them into a fairly standard premise that should allow them room to bounce off one another and enjoy themselves. It is a tried and true comic formula, the unleashing of a set of comedic personas on a familiar plot, the sole purpose of that stock set-up being to avoid getting in the way of the chemistry and charm of the cast. Wine Country has quite the cast; Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, Rachel Dratch, Ana Gasteyer, Paula Pell and Emily Spivey, along with supporting turns from Tina Fey and Cherry Jones. That should be enough to get any comedy half way home.

Toast of the town.

The actual plot of Wine Country is fairly simple as such things go, but this is a canny move. Wine Country is designed as a cast showcase, and so the plot’s primary function is to serve as justification for bringing (and keeping) these characters together so that the film can bounce from one scene to the next. Wine Country is the story of a group of friends who come together to celebrate a fiftieth birthday, traversing the eponymous region while each dealing with their own personal and professional crises. Character traits are arbitrary, and their arcs simplistic; in many cases, it seems like the characters were developed through nothing more than vague word association, a collection of generic adjectives (“busy”, “immature”, “obsessive”) thrown into a hat and selected at random.

While this does hold Wine Country back, it isn’t the biggest issue with the film. Quite simply, Wine Country is put together in a frustratingly clumsy and haphazard manner, looking a feeling like a cloying made-for-television movie that somehow stumbled upon a phenomenal cast. The film looks flat and over-lit, even allowing for the sunny Californian setting. Many of the jokes feel lazy and obvious, grabbing the lowest hanging fruit; perhaps appropriate given how much time the film spends in vineyards. The soundtrack is awful and on the nose, slowly and loudly suffocating any genuine emotion the film might attempt to evoke. There’s no doubt that the cast and crew making Wine Country had a great time making the film, but none of that carries over to the finished product.

‘Til the (fri)end of time.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: comedy, female friendship, film, may poehler, Movie, review, the trip, tina fey | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Detective Pikachu

Posted on May 5, 2019 by Darren

Detective Pikachu is disarmingly cute, both the movie and the character.

There are a number of serious problems with Detective Pikachu, although none of them are so serious as to become fatal flaws and most are easily explained by virtue of the film’s target audience. Most obviously, Detective Pikachu is never a movie that is particularly elegant in its storytelling. This is a film that burdened with an impressive volume of visual and spoken exposition, particularly in the opening half-hour. Characters are constantly expositing to one another, and often spelling out their motivations and perspectives for the benefit of the audience.

“Just want to take another Pikachu.”

However, once Detective Pikachu gets past that, there’s a lot of charm on display. A lot of that is down to the two central performances from Ryan Reynolds and Justice Smith, both of whom provide solid emotional throughlines and play the comic absurdity of the premise. There is also a lot to be said for the efficiency of the script, which rockets through virtually everything that the audience might expect from a Pokémon film. The energy of the cast prevents it from ever feeling too much like a checklist.

Detective Pikachu never quite achieves the level of transcendence, never pushes past its simple premise towards something more intriguing or compelling. Instead, Detective Pikachu delivers pretty much what it promises, with an endearing and infectious smile on its face.

No drive.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: film, Movie, non-review review, pikachu, pokemon, review | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile

Posted on May 2, 2019 by Darren

There’s an interesting film somewhere within Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile.

After all, the serial killer is a fascinating figure in the American popular consciousness. Although the serial killer’s stature has declined since its peak in the nineties, the recent “true crime” boom on both streaming services and in podcasts have helped to reignite some interest in the figure. Indeed, it is worth noting that Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile feels almost like a companion piece to director Joe Berlinger’s other Ted Bundy project, the Netflix documentary Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes. As such, it is perhaps revealing that Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile feels like an appendix to The Ted Bundy Tapes, an extra that dramatises the meatier material presented in that streaming service true crime documentary.

Killer good looks.

After all, although Berlinger has worked on narrative films before, he is known primarily as a documentarian. (There is some small irony that his most prominent narrative film is Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows.) Inevitably, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile would feel secondary. It may have premiered on the festival before The Ted Bundy Tapes, but it was released afterwards, ensuring that to the casual viewer it will seem like something of a response to that breakout hit. More than that, though, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile feels like it has very little new to say about either its serial killer or its cultural context. There is surprisingly little in Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile that isn’t evoked by the words “Ted Bundy.”

The serial killer is a well-explored subject in popular fiction, having been the focus of decades of narratives and deconstructions. Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile looks for an interesting angle on its subject, but never finds a way in. The result is a film that has an interesting premise, but which struggled to get under the skin of a serial killer.

Slice of life.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Extremely Wicked Shockingly Evil And Vile, film, jon berlinger, Movie, non-review review, review, ted bundy, Zac Efron | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: The Curse of La Llorona

Posted on May 1, 2019 by Darren

The Curse of La Llorona is fairly solid as contemporary studio horrors go.

Although the arrival of Avengers: Endgame has a lot of attention focused on the largest and most successful shared cinematic universe of the twenty-first century, there is a lot to be said for the strange horror universe that has been built outwards from The Conjuring. Although this trend is most overt in The Conjuring 2, the rare horror movie to also feature a car chase sequence, there is something fascinating in how these films have transformed studio horror into a blockbuster concern.

Mother have mercy.

There is a reason that these films are released during the summer months, as counter-intuitive as that might seem. Again, discussing The Curse of La Llorona in such terms might seem cynical, but it is genuinely striking. It takes a lot of work to satisfy the competing demands of the two genres; the shock of horror with the familiarity of blockbuster storytelling. The challenge with The Curse of La Llorona lies in offering audiences something that satisfies all their expectations of a film like this, while still offering a few shocks and starts along the way. It is a remarkable accomplishment.

The Curse of La Llorona strikes that balance relatively well. The film knows the formats and rhythms of a horror film, and director Michael Chaves knows both what the audience expects and how to work within that format to build a genuine and compelling sense of dread. The Curse of La Llorona is well-made, efficient, and delivers what the audience anticipates from a Conjuring spin-off. There’s something endearing in the reliability, in the care with which the film strikes these sorts of balances.

Scream queen.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: children, fears, film, ghost, horror, la llorona, Movie, murder, raymond cruz, reactionary, review, seventies, social conservatism, the conjuring | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: A Dog’s Journey

Posted on May 1, 2019 by Darren

A Dog’s Journey is incredibly earnest.

To be fair, it kind of goes with the territory. A sequel to A Dog’s Purpose, the film fits comfortably in the same “narrating baby or animal observes the adult world” subgenre as the Look Who’s Talking films. The basic premise of the film finds a beloved family pet reincarnating over and over again in order to serve as a spiritual companion to a family across three generations. Voiced by Josh Gad across a wealth of breeds, genders and personas, this “boss dog” finds themselves drawn towards a family struggling to hold itself together amid incredible internal tension.

Hardly a crowning accomplishment.

The premise and execution are admittedly very hokey. The characterisation is threadbare. The actors vary wildly in terms of skill. The jokes are often hackneyed and overly familiar. The script is full of strange narrative cul de sacs and tangents that occasionally stall the forward momentum of the film. A Dog’s Journey is an exceptionally tightly (or even well-) constructed film. However, the almost aching levels of sincerity almost hold it together despite these sheering forces.

At the heart of A Dog’s Journey is an incredibly simple-yet-heartfelt idea of the relationship that exists between a dog an it’s owner. Late in the film, one character concedes to another, “It must be nice to have something that loves you unconditionally.” For all the film’s flaws, it never doubts the idea that the love of a dog for its owner (and perhaps vice versa) is truly unconditional and uncompromising, no matter how complicated the world around that relationship might become.

Fields of gold.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: a dog's journey, Dog, film, Movie, non-review review, review | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Avengers – Endgame

Posted on April 23, 2019 by Darren

It says a lot about the state of contemporary pop culture that the biggest movie of the year is essentially a clip episode.

Pop culture has always been vaguely nostalgic, evoking an idealised past and reminding audiences of times when the future seemed brighter. After all, much of the New Hollywood canon is explicitly nostalgic, sixties and seventies films that pay loving homage to the thirties and the forties, often explicitly; The Sting, The Godfather, Paper Moon, Chinatown, Bonnie and Clyde. The past has always had a certain allure for cinema, perhaps because that’s what pictures have always been; individual moments captured on film and frozen in time, removed from their original context. Film is simply those frozen images run together to create the illusion of movement and life. Every film is a time machine, some are just more explicit than others.

Assembly line.

However, there is something fascinating about the modern wave of nostalgia, the speed at which pop culture is consuming itself. Recent waves of seventies, eighties and nineties nostalgia are still cresting. Earlier this summer, Captain Marvel channeled some of this nineties nostalgia into blockbuster (and Blockbuster) form. However, it also feels like nostalgia is getting closer and closer to the present, brushing up against the current moment. In some respects, the success of Lady Bird is indicative here. After all, Lady Bird is a film that is explicitly nostalgic about the post-9/11 era, evoked through footage of the Iraq War and the sounds of Justin Timberlake playing at a teen house party.

Avengers: Endgame is a strangely nostalgic beast. It is not strange that the film is nostalgic; after all, this is something of a coda to a decade of superhero films. However, it is strange how that nostalgia brushes up against the present, the climax of the film feeling very much like a loving homage to Avengers: Infinity War, a film that only premiered one year ago.

Stark raving mad…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: avengers, avengers: endgame, avengers: infinity war, film, militarism, Movie, nihilism, non-review review, review, the past, time, time travel | 18 Comments »

New Podcast! Scannain Podcast (2019) #14!

Posted on April 12, 2019 by Darren

It’s time for the Scannain podcast!

This week, I join Jay Coyle and Luke Dunne from Film in Dublin to discuss the week in film. As usual, we talk about what we watched this week, including an in-depth discussion of Unicorn Store, the charm of Grosse Point Blank, a reflection on the two sequels to The Matrix, the power of Little Woods and the inevitability of remaking Akira. In terms of film news, the big news of the week is the launch of Criterion Channel, which is now streaming classic movie content online. There is also the passing of veteran character actor Seymour Cassel. And a nice bracing dose of tax reform, with revisions made to Section 481.

All of this plus the top ten and the new releases.

The top ten:

What Men Want
Five Feet Apart
The Sisters Brothers
Missing Link
Captain Marvel
Us
Peppa Pig: Festival of Fun
Pet Sematary
Shazam!
Dumbo

New releases:

Wonder Park
Hell Boy
Don’t Go
Little
mid90s
Wild Rose

Filed under: Movies, Podcasts! | Tagged: captain marvel, dumbo, film, grosse point blank, little woods, Movie, review, shazam!, the matrix, unicorn store, us | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Little Woods

Posted on April 11, 2019 by Darren

Little Woods is a slow and somber film that never rushes, perhaps because it understands that its characters have no place to go.

There’s a strong central irony built into Little Woods, a story that unfolds against the north-western frontier of Washington State. Ollie lives on what is effectively the edge of the frontier, that great American wilderness. However, manifest destiny has not delivered. The frontier is not as vast as it might seem. Instead, Ollie finds herself trapped on the edges, pressed against the limits of the United States. Little Woods is a story about the boundaries on the extremes of the American Dream. It is no coincidence that Nia DaCosta’s theatrical debut opens and closes at the Canadian border; it is a story of character who are pressed and squeezed against the margins, at the end of everything that they know.

The circumstances Tessa-t her.

There is a compelling stillness to Little Woods, anchored in a fantastic central performance from Tessa Thompson. Little Woods works well in several different modes: as a character study, as a crime drama, as a frontier story. The film is suspenseful when it needs to be, capable of making the audience squirm when it wants them to. However, it is most effective in its relative stillness. Little Woods never feels sensationalist or absurd. It never feels exploitative or stylised. Instead, there is something very effectively grounded and mundane in the portrait that the film traces of those people trapped on the margins. There is something very matter-of-fact about the way in which Little Woods portrays the choices (or, more importantly, the lack of choices) afforded its characters.

Little Woods is an evocative, effective and atmospheric about characters living in a liminal space.