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Hell Hath No Fury (2021)
Femme Fatale
Really I decided to write a review once I saw that it had a really poor rating on IMDB. Just 4.7.
By no means this is a movie that deserves such a poor rating. Not sure why this was so.
The setup is a twisty one with French, Germans and of course the unholy Americans neck deep in a post war Gold heist.
Central to the plot is a woman Marie that was in bed with the Krauts but only for her ends. Obviously with the World War, can the spoils be far behind? There is Gold, does not seem an awful lot but for those times, it might mean the difference between a life on a farm versus a life in a city with all mod cons.
The plot has some twists along the way and some decent war action and a good background score.
Give it a watch - you will not regret it.
Funny Pages (2022)
Not So Funny
Well...this was one of those slice of life movies. Usually such movies have been satisfying in the past in capable hands.
Typically we are introduced to a set of characters, all dysfunctional in their own ways. Once the stage is set, a situation is created for conflict and the script and the characters take care of the.trajectary of the script.
In this case though, there just does not seem any point beyond introduction of the characters.
It hardly helps that the main premise is fairly weak. A teenager rebels to follow his own path of being a cartoon artist. Apparently he is trying to find traction in a cutthroat world and meets a less than interesting set of characters. Their interface is the bulk of the movie and it is DULL.
A Most Wanted Man (2014)
Tinkerbell Spy
I am a sucker for slow burn kind of Spy films so settled in to watch this one based on the blurb.
Well it was slow alright!
A plot that takes off at the start with a Muslim Chechen swimming into Germany, specifically Berlin. Does it have a shore though? Not sure.
Anyway - immediately we have the CIA and the local constabulary alerted and on his tail.
We have a Human Rights lawyer, helpfully on the far left and willing to provide legal cover for the Chechen and to get his paperwork sorted. The story unfolds with his hide and seek from the law and theres a shady backstory with his father and some illegal stash that has been locked into a numbered account. Plus there is a Muslim charity under the scanner for terror funding and how their story intersects with this cat and mouse tale.
The CIA chief played by a morose looking Phillip Seymour Hoffman is central to the plot. It has quite a few holes but hangs together decently.
Eat Pray Love (2010)
Indigestion
A statcatto tale of a woman trying to find her bearings after a self induced breakup.
This did have a kernel of an idea of finding redemption after a few hard knocks in life.
There is surely a movie waiting to be made on these very themes. But this one falls short, way short.
The episodic nature of the unfolding story does not help either.
Some location hunting in Bali and India adds to local color.
Julia Roberts delivers a forced performance going thru the motions trying to show great distress going thru multiple males in her life. Just seemed overdone.
Plus the shifts were too sudden, with locations, plot points, characters just showing up randomly. Could have been way better.
Ladies in Black (2018)
Shopping Down Under
I always love ensemble films...It's not just one story you are watching, always more than one.
So I was already keyed up for this one thinking it would be one of those sweet little films about a bunch of Ladies in Black.
And I was right - no unpleasantness, just a set of characters that you can root for. It was only later that i saw the director was Bruce Beresford.
And a simple tale of a department store in Sydney Australia just after the big War becomes something more than a tale of a cast of characters.
Bruce has this ability to take something simple and transform the viewing experience. Here too he does it with elan. The direction is just right with not a false step. Theres a bunch of store ladies and their lives lived out under the shade of the war just gone by, we get a glimpse into how the great outback was created and the lives they led with refugees from various parts of the war torn Europe making their way Down Under.
It's a fascinating piece of Oz history on celluloid thru the eyes of one of it's most accomplished auteurs.
Catch the Fair One (2021)
Unboxed
There's a slew of films currently playing about missing/kidnapped children. One wonders what kind of epidemic America has going for it - the prolific guns and the kidnapping of girls. Certainly not good days for the US of A.
Anyway - this film is also of the same theme - a fairly straightforward tale of a missing girl and the search for her b y her sister.
Unusual is that the main protoganist is a girl and a boxer at that so that takes care of the physical part the role demands.
Kali Reis is a stark presence swaggering on screen physically. She is not asked to emote much which suits her just fine.
She does a fine job of the action and there is not much more to fill up the movie. It is quite spare on the storytelling bits, just getting right into it with the missing girl.
The trail that leads her to the abductors is given a short shrift and shown their hand early on. The rest is a propulsive plot that carries the film forwards as Kali tries to get at the missing girl.
While straightforward, worth a dekko.
Broken Law (2020)
Route Irish
Route Irish
Great Britain has a healthy legacy of what they call Geezer Films - typically main characters are from the wrong side of the tracks. They usually get caught up in some nafarious activity, mostly cast as victims of circumstance rather than shapers of it.
This is from the other side of the river - Ireland. This is as classic a tale as you can get - a geezer flick with 2 brothers on opposite sides of the law, heck could be a Bollywood film.
The direction is tight and the characters flawed so it is watchable - just about.
Theres not much by way of location photography, majority of it indoors and all that.
Still worth your time and a look into how the other half lives beyond the pretty architecture and clean streets.
Booksmart (2019)
Jejune
Honestly for a film that advertises it's intentions IN THE TITLE, Hello...Its no different than a million other nerdy comedies that were so much the rage in the 80's and 90's.
The premise is pretty standard - have a couple of nerds, girls in this case, who realize that they have got the short end of the stick at their Graduation. The realization is that while they were swotting their books and shunning the standard debauchery that accompanies a frat college lifedom, others have been having way more fun than them and have got into good Ivy Leagues as well.
The premise is a worthy one, enough to damage any collegian who realizes whats passed them by. But its the treatment after that where the girls try to make up for lost time that the plot comes undone.
It folllows the usual markers of such juvenile comedies - sexual talk, banter, wierd classmates, big reveals and a possible coming of age.
All this is familiar territory, one expected some newness but as it turns out, even this is an ambition too high.
Aftersun (2022)
In the Cloud
Honestly the reviews that I read pushed me to watch this film.
However, if there was a metric for the difference between a Review and it's actual experience, this film would probably top it.
At least for me that is.
Supposedly this is to depict through a backward gaze, the 'tumultous' relationship between a reckless dad and his precocious daughter.
I failed to see any of these adjectives in the film making me wonder if we are talking about the same film.
It was slow and just failed to draw me into the tale. There was never any sence of conflict - internal or external that drove the narrative.
Maybe the others saw with greater insight what I failed to see. If you are a 'normal' viewer of films, suggest you give this a wide berth.
Bones and All (2022)
Blood Menu
This film has got quite a lot of positive reviews and thats the reason i chose to watch it in the first place.
This kind of fantasy is not my genre at all.
Anyway - turns out this is one of those Young Adult fictions adapted to the Screen.
It effectively constructs a world of 'Eaters' - cannibals that is. The era seems late 80's as theres a cassette walkman. Wonder what plot device forced a 1980 feel though to be fair, it might just the Director being faithful with the Book.
This is not for the faint of heart so lets get that out of the way.
Theres gross bodily functions of a different kind here. But the leads are servicable and theres enough tension with a wily character called Sully - another Eater.
Apparently Eaters can smell each other, nice device to get them together.
On the whole a decent watch but dont spend money to do so.
Boiling Point (2021)
Not Masterchef!
Audiences dulled into soporofic epicurean fills, be warned! This is not for those fed on a diet of sumptous meals cooked in competetions under the glare of studio lights. This is the real deal.
Right from the grubby interiors of a restaurant somewhere in London, to the dim lighting, the borderline racist customers, the multiethnic staff this is as real as it gets.
The setting is an evening in a high pressure restaurant where the focus is on the chief chef and his crew just this close to tipping over. A lot of care and effort goes into setting the stage and introducing the characters.
Along with Andy the main chef, a Gordon Ramsey light character, there are the others - a reliable deputy, a couple of undertrials, a pastry section and the owner - a girl who is just getting to grips with the beast she has taken on.
The Camerawork is an unsung hero in this with long tracking shots, putting the viewer right in the centre of the action.
The back stories and travails of each of the characters is nicely fleshed out, with absolutely the lightest of touches. Testament to the writing that we need not linger more than a few minutes with each to get to know how they fit into the plot.
Absolutely must watch!
Allagash (2020)
Old rage
A tight simple plot with a handful of characters, some savoury some not so much, makes this an easy watch.
The plot is fairly simple - a vicious gang carries out a heist at a casino and get away with a stash of cash.
Thats on one side - the other side has an Old ex marine who lives a lonely life in the snowy terrain occassionally hunting deer. Lead is rather uncharacteristically Tom Berenger pushing 75 if not a day.
There is a back story covered in passing about his family or lack of it and a tragic incident to give the story the much lacking emotional heft.
Be that as it may, the story plods on - on his regular deer hunt, Tom mistakenly kills a woman who is part of the heist team. Fortitously she is carrying a bag with the stash. One twinge of excitement is the fallout of the killing. Tom's reaction and flustered handling at least shows acuity by the director.
The rest of the plot is quite predictable with Tom keeping the stash into a nice little Ice cave.
The baddies get it the goodies get away, sort of. Anyway - it all ties up in the end.
A Good Woman Is Hard to Find (2019)
Femme Fatale
One of many of the Brit Gangster movies that are literally dime a dozen nowadays.
The British film industry has really cornered the gangster-geezer shtick for a while now.
As an aside, seems rather ambitious for a country that size but with liberal immigration bringing in savoury as well as the unsavoury it was but a matter of time that those at the bottom of the food chain would migrate to the lowest end of the drug dealing chain.
This film talks about one such where we have a woman (the said 'Good Woman' in the title) that has a murky past.
She was married to a small time drug dealer that got knocked off when ourt with his toddler son. The toddler has lost his ability to speak as a result but this is a key plot point later in the film.
Sarah Bolger plays her own namesake with 2 kids to manage that has a drug bust land up in her lap literally.
A small time bottom feeder steals a stash of drugs from the local heavies and follows Sarah into her house and uses it as a hideout. The rest is fairly predictable arc of Sarah turning on the heavies. But it does require a suspension of belief what with some pretty gruesome plot points.
It's an average thriller and watch if you must.
Hytti nro 6 (2021)
Train pane
Both an unusual film and yet doesnt stray far enough from standard tropes of romcoms/
Unusual in the sense that this is set in the hinterlands of Russia, not a geography known for movie sets.
The locales are as much of a cast as the likeable leads.
Mostly a two hander with a Finnish woman and a Russian man who meet on a train and forge a connection, sort of.
The lady is an archeological student and is keen to visit Petroglyphs, we never see them except in a book, no spoilers here.
The Russian is a typical for a russian male I guess, with the booze and ciggies flowing non stop.
They first rub up against eash other and then the thaw. It's handled unfussily and typical of the locales not too much of emotions in play.
The ending is ambigous in keeping with the theme of a brief encounter.
Worth wathcing for the Russki trains, ice laden far lands and a peep into a socialist Russia lost now, probably forever.
Better Watch Out (2016)
Home Alone and wild
Call it Home Alone for the Internet age.
This is a delicious twisty tale definitely not for those being baby sat. Harkens back to the Adventures in Babysitting era but from the wrong end of the telescope.
Requires suspension of belief but if you get past that, it's manic energy sucks you in.
Call it Scream redux.
Its the cast that takes this tale to the next level. Again suspension of belief is necessary.
There's enough guns and psychos in America to make this a cautionary tale though.
There is quite a lot of blood and gore so tuck your kids in for the night before you switch this on.
But go for it!
Ascension (2021)
Chinese Whispers
More a series of vignettes than a coherent whole, this is a fascinating documentary neverthless.
Focusing on the modern China and the multitudes of professions that dwell within, it takes a scalpel to the oft cited Chinese dream. A traverse thru the diverse Chinese working class landscape it attempts to show how the underclass is being groomed with the promise of a better tomorrow.
There's arresting imagery and by the end the viewer gets a fair idea of how the class heirarchy works. This is laser focussed on the working class and the only brush with the elite is thru the tools embraced by the elite - the fancy restaurants or the cosmetic industry.
One wonders though, how the director managed to pull this off.
Trois souvenirs de ma jeunesse (2015)
French fare
This is one of those genres that can be likened to a literary referential term - buildingsroman.
Starting with a French foreign affairs diplomat who is returning from Tajikistan after a decade.
On being intercepted at the Airport customs by an intelligence officer seeking to understand his double life.
That triggers a series of flashbacks that take us through his life from a child to a teenager and into adulthood.
The script runs us through his dysfunctional family and his troubled relationship with his father adn mother.
His siblings and his inevitable love affair with a slighly off kilter girl well into their adulthood.
It is slightly underwhelming after a decent build up.
The cast is predictably pretty (aah the french!) but while interesting eventually it doesnt amount to much.
All the Old Knives (2022)
Spy Adults
This is a nice layered telling of an investigation by the US spy agency of an event in the past.
Chris Pine has to rehash the events of the fateful day when a whole planeload of people were killed by a Hijacker, possibly with help from a mole in the Agency.
The premise lends itself to a Rashomon style treatment which is done fairly effectively, the tale unfurling itself in flashbacks over a tense dinner.
Well worth your time.
Chris Pine has t he hangdog look of a man in torment and Thandiwe gives a unstated performance that gives little away.
The direction is tight and Production values kept at level with only a few locations making the scenes.
The Marksman (2021)
Ho Hum Ranger
This is a tale done to death by now.
Washed out cop/marine/lone ranger gets into a pickle with an orphan kid and has to get him somewhere escaping nasties on the way.
So whats new - not much as it turns out. Liam Neeson could have done this in his sleep and probably did. The age is showing now - can't Hollywood get a new leading man?
Anyway - the film trudges along on a well worn path with few surprises.
Watch if you must.
The Years Between (1946)
War and its discontents
Embellished and elegant take on what happens to war widows in the post WWII era.
A war vet returns after being presumed dead to a world changed drastically on his domestic front.
The story reflects the mores of the time and the pat ending gives it away. But the acting is first rate and youget to see post war Britain for a bit.
The Intimate Stranger (1956)
Studio Fail
Slight pedestrian effort by today's standards. A main character who's a philanderer, now married and going straight, gets accused of having an affair.
The main character is shown up to be a bit of a cad so doesn't gain any sympathy.
But he's a producer now and theres a game afoot to get him out. How it resolves itself is the rest of the effort. Avoidable.
Too Late for Tears (1949)
Femme Fatale
If you are able to get past the initial casting of the main character thatshows their hand early on, without a build up, it's a decent watch for a noir.
Woman finds money tossed in her car and falls for the easy lucre. Beyond that is her being chased by a variety of jocks and cops.
A tad predictable but the decent casting makes a go of it.
Blue Ruin (2013)
Revenge Inct
This is a bleak 2 hander with a minimal cast and draws it's plot tight.
Murder begets murder and law enforcement can take a hike.
Bleak, stark and spare storytelling at it's best.
Check out the directors other work. Equally watchable.
Gone to Earth (1950)
Medieval Whimsy
This is a strange little whimsy of a film. Ostensibly a period piece but without the standard royalty. A country affair with a raw woman wooed by 2 gentlemen - one a timid priest and the other a rakish squire.
The girl herself is a strange one, with weird notions and even weirder accent.
Like I said, a strange one. Watch it for a taste of old England country, costumes and language.
The Fall of the House of Usher (1960)
Creepy as heck
Not a fan of the horror genre so if I say this is tough to watch, it means it's pretty well made so those who can, go for it.