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Archives For November 30, 1999

Under The Skin (2014)

June 16, 2014 — Leave a comment

When we first meet Scarlett Johansson, she is carefully removing and wearing the clothes of a dead woman. Wordlessly, she climbs into a white van and for a large part of the first act we follow her as she drives around Glasgow picking up young men. Those unfortunate to accept a lift are promised sex and some bragging rights down the pub later on. What really happens is only hinted at and never properly explained. Which summarises Under The Skin as a whole really.

A lot has been made about who Johansson really is, with many articles saying up front what is only really revealed in the final ten minutes of the film. However, this semi-spoiler won’t go much further in helping you fully understand what’s truly going on. With the exception of her discourse with the gentlemen of Scotland, Johansson’s role is practically mute. When not out collecting, she wanders around Glasgow in a daze. She’s clearly not from this planet, let alone this country. In one particularly harrowing scene, she leaves a baby to drown simply because it’s not part of her plan. Whatever that may be. Whilst her actions seem atrocious, there’s an underlying sympathy that suggests she’s just following orders. A mysterious biker follows her everywhere and inspects her on occasion. Director Jonathan Glazer doesn’t allow for breakdown scenes. No one recaps why tab A has to go into tab B. It simply does.

The closing scene of Glazer’s Sexy Beast hinted at the surrealism he was capable of playing with. And whilst it isn’t going to challenge the likes of The Cremaster Cycle, its structure and pace provides enough for people to dissect afterwards if they’re inclined to do so. It is powerfully dreamy piece of filmmaking that adds a seriousness and artful tone to sci-fi that can often be missing, reminding us equally of work of Malick and Lynch and riding that thin line between cinema and modern art.

The original review can be found here: https://earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com/2014/06/16/under-the-skin-2014/

About The Author
My name is John Noonan. I’m a freelance writer that specialises in arts and entertainment. From genre flicks to chick flicks, I love the stuff. So much so, I started a film review blog at earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com. I also contribute to online and hard copy press, including FilmInk magazine.

If you like what you see, I am available for hire. You can contact me via the social media channels above or the form on my home page.

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RoboCop (2014)

June 16, 2014 — Leave a comment

Michael Keaton plays the CEO of OmniCorp; a corporation with designs installing their humanoid drones across the United States in the spirit of maintaining peace. And profit. And justice. But mainly profit. Despite having the media in his back pocket (personified by Samuel L Jackson’s Bill O’Reilly – sorry Pat Novak), Keaton is having trouble convincing America that machines with deadly weapons are really the best thing for policing its streets. When young detective, Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) is horrifically disfigured after a car bomb, a plan is put into place to bring about the first hybrid of man and machine, or – to those of you paying attention at the back – RoboCop!

Whilst there are car chases and gunfights and all the fun things to keep you chomping on your popcorn, his interpretation of RoboCop feels more like the opening chapter to a story than a stand-alone film with its heavy expositon. The script seems to think we need to see every step towards Murphy’s transformation from emotional human being to steely eyed, unquestioning drone. So, we witness training montages with watchmen’s Jackie Earle Haley’s mean sunuvabitch drone controller and boardroom discussions with Gary Oldman’s compassionate medical team. It’s all stuff that could have been condescend to 20 minutes of the opening act.

The nihilism of the original has been jettisoned in favour of more emotion through Murphy’s family who, unlike in the original, are front and centre for the majority of the film. As such, we spend large gun-less sections of the film worrying about Murphy’s humanity and compassion. It’s a bold move, but it doesn’t entirely convince and, unfortunately, it all just feels superfluous to what people have paid to see, which is RoboCop robocopping.

When it was announced that Paul Verhoeven’s seminal and ultra-violent RoboCop was up for a reboot, eyebrows were raised so high, they could only be brought down by industrial machinery. But on the basis of what’s on show Jose Padilha’s reboot, there’s not that much on show that justifies the vitriol that was fired at it with angst cannons. But then it’s also not exactly winning us over.

Original review can be found at https://earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com/2014/06/16/robocop-2014/

About The Author
My name is John Noonan. I’m a freelance writer that specialises in arts and entertainment. From genre flicks to chick flicks, I love the stuff. So much so, I started a film review blog at earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com. I also contribute to online and hard copy press, including FilmInk magazine.

If you like what you see, I am available for hire. You can contact me via the social media channels above or the form on my home page.

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52 Tuesdays

May 5, 2014 — Leave a comment

No matter how close we are to someone, do we really know everything about them? How aware are we of all the pieces that make them a whole? In 52 Tuesdays, teenager Billie (Tilda Cobham-Hervey) certainly thinks she is always on the ball. Somewhat precocious, she shares a happy home life with her mother, Jane (Del Herbert-Jane) and partyboy Uncle Harry (Mario Spate). When Jane reveals her desire to become a man, Billie is packed off to live with her father Tom (Beau Travis Williams) whilst Jane transitions into James; both mother and daughter agreeing that they’ll meet every Tuesday to spend some quality time together.

Directed by Sophie Hyde and co-written with Matthew Cormack, and filmed over the course of literally 52 Tuesdays, James and Billie are shown taking two different, but similar journeys to define themselves. Whilst James is building a new life for himself, Billie, initially supportive of him, begins to flounder and seeks some form of control in her own. This blossoms into an sexual exploration with two seniors at her high school, played by Imogen Archer and Sam Althuizen.

Read the rest of the review at earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com

About The Author
My name is John Noonan. I’m a freelance writer that specialises in arts and entertainment. From genre flicks to chick flicks, I love the stuff. So much so, I started a film review blog at earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com. I also contribute to online and hard copy press, including FilmInk magazine.

If you like what you see, I am available for hire. You can contact me via the social media channels above or the form on my home page.

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Captain America: The Winter Soldier

April 28, 2014 — Leave a comment

Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), aka Captain America, is slowly adjusting to his new reality of modern day Ameerica. Like Tony Stark in Iron Man 3, he’s slightly shellshocked from what happened in New York during The Avengers. Despite seeking a quiet life (he’s making a list of things he’s missed out on, including The Beatles), he’s routinely called up by SHIELD Director, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), to perform clean up operations. When a hit is taken out on a member of SHIELD, it sparks off a series of events that leads Rogers and skilled assassin, the Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), down a path filled with intrigue and conspiracy. Albeit a conspiracy where people can punch through walls, which presumably Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward didn’t do during Watergate. But who is the mysterious Winter Soldier? How is he connected to Captain America? And why does he look like James Franco’s Green Goblin? Only one of those questions will be answered in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

This is the latest episode in the Marvel movie universe. And we’re not using the term ‘episode’ lightly here either. Whilst each film stands on it’s own quite well, the crisscrossing of characters from each franchise and passing references to other adventures makes it all feel like it’s part of the continuing narrative in a soap opera. One day, it’s probably going to get a bit too much. Like the Saw franchise, there’s a real danger of alienating a potential audience by making them have to see all the movies to make sense of just one. However, that day is yet to come, and Winter Soldier manages to keep everything balanced.

In fact, this is all beginning to look a bit effortless now. Sticking with the soap opera analogy, we are very much mid-season and everyone is clearly comfortable in their respective roles. It’s hard to imagine anyone else in the role of Captain America; as Evans leaps around like a parkour addict on speed, whilst staring diligently into the middle distance. He’s even given some emotions like a real boy, particularly in a tear inducing scene that sees the Cap paying a visit to an old friend from back in the day. Progress has most certainly been made with regards to the Black Widow. Having started off as a thing Tony Stark wanted to put his willy in during Iron Man 2, the character was given a personality in The Avengers which is fleshed out further here. Whilst a will-they-won’t-they idea of romance between Widow and the Cap fails to be believable, the sparring between the two certainly gives the film some of it’s best moments; Black Widow trying to set Rogers up with someone whilst interrogating a suspect is particularly playful and well-timed.

One of the more surprising additions to the Marvel stable is Robert Redford as Fury’s superior at SHIELD, Alexander Pierce, provides the film with some meaty thespian chops. A nod to 70s movies the film emulates, it’s always pleasant to see an actor of Redford’s calibre treat the script with some actual gravitas, rather than phoning it in waiting for the ink to dry on the cheque.

It’s Anthony Mackie and Emily VanCamp who who get the pooiest end of the stick. Mackie as Steve Roger’s new friend, Sam Wilson and VanCamp as Sharon Carter. Neither are given much to do with Mackie’s climatic fight scene weirdly edited so that we only get to see the aftermath and VanCamp basically pouting. Her character is almost the antithesis of Black Widow.

That said, some ropey CGI aside, Winter Soldier contains some exhilarating chases and bone crunching fight scenes. It’s no real surprise that the directors, Anthony and Joe Russo have already been called in for the threequel. If it manages to exceed or even just maintain the momentum of Winter Soldier than we will be very happy indeed.

About The Author
My name is John Noonan. I’m a freelance writer that specialises in arts and entertainment. From genre flicks to chick flicks, I love the stuff. So much so, I started a film review blog at earlybirdfilm.wordpress.com. I also contribute to online and hard copy press, including FilmInk magazine.

If you like what you see, I am available for hire. You can contact me via the social media channels above or the form on my home page.

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April 13, 2014 — Leave a comment

Paranormal Entity

The main criticism of films nowadays is ‘we’ve seen it all before.’ Often it’s simply a case of awareness that a film’s ideas, themes and execution is so old, cave men gave up writing it on the wall. In the case of Paranormal Entity, we have literally seen this all before. A demon terrorizes a family for 80 very un-fun minutes before shooting its load with two minutes of gore, breasts and wobbly camera work. Hawked out around the same time as Paranormal Activity, there is very little about this film that doesn’t make the whole genre of found footage bow its head and say ‘I’m sorry.’ Inane, derivative and most criminally of all, very, very boring.

Beast From Haunted Cave

Ever wondered what From Dusk Till Dawn would be like if you removed all the celebrities, pop culture and vampires? No? Well, tough, here’s Beast from Haunted Cave. Produced by Gene Corman and directed by Charles B. Griffiths, the film is pretty light on beasts and haunted caves. Clocking in at just over an hour, what it does have in abundance is a lot a of hipcat bank robbers making a break for it across the South Dakota snowy mountains. Snow, man! Yeah! Knowing how the Cormans work, you probably think this was originally a bank heist movie and someone Sellotaped an creature feature dénouement on the end. Well, you’re more or less right; Beast From Haunted Cave was originally a film called Naked Paradise before it was rewritten by Griffith. See, every day’s a school day.

Straight on till Morning

A young naïve Liverpudlian, Brenda, seeks a new life in the crazy world of London. Wanting ever so desperately to have a baby, the woman-child kidnaps a man’s dog, returning it to him in the hopes of a blossoming romance. The man in question is Peter, a psychopath who believes everything is for him to control. A sadistic blend of Secretary and Peter Pan, it all makes for uncomfortable viewing. This is mainly down to the fact that deep in its cold centre, this is almost a love story. No matter how manipulative Peter is, Brenda will stand by him. Mean-spirited, gritty and with a gut punch of an ending, Straight on Till Morning is the possibly the closest Hammer will ever be to producing a romance.

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