The Master

“Masterful Manipulation”

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix give the performances of their careers, in this outstanding outing from esteemed director Paul Thomas Anderson.

Unfairly dubbed as the “scientology” movie, The Master is loosely based on that controversial cult’s founder, Lancaster Dodd (Hoffman) aka The Master - a charismatic and manipulative orator of The Cause. Phoenix plays Freddie, a veteran sailor who struggles to re-enter civilized society after returning home, instead spending his days inebriated and causing havoc. During one of his benders, he finds himself on a boat with The Master, and soon seeks out his salvation.

Anderson directs this fascinating character piece with a sophisticated surrealism, veering into an unnatural shot style that creates a disturbing atmosphere. Moments of scripted stand-offs between Hoffman’s intellectual lectures and Phoenix’s slurred ramblings are intense and gripping, delving into the complicated nature of their relationship - at one time father/son another teacher/student.

Tone and setting are authentically subtle, with minor references to time and space, whilst allowing the enduring themes to keep the film relevant. Arguably, the film’s proclivity for quick cuts and stops make the storytelling frustrating, however, anyone in-tune with Anderson’s There Will Be Blood will already be used to this style, and will revel in it.

Whilst Anderson’s filmmaking is undoubtedly incredible, The Master finds its strength in its two central performers. Hoffman and Phoenix engage in a fierce battle of wits and emotions that makes the film one of the best in recent years.

Fast and Furious 5 (2011)

“Vomit Inducing”

After one too many recommendations, I put aside my palpable dislike for the Fast and Furious franchise, and watched number 5 - on the basis that if so many people were saying I should watch it, there must be something to it. And there is!

Fast and Furious 5 has the most vomit-inducing acting I have witnessed in a feature film for a long time. At points, when Vin Diesel is attempting some quasi-moody-anti-hero with a close-up of his inner turmoil, it’s like watching Uncle Fester from the Addams Family sitting on the toilet, pushing out a big one. Honestly, this film reeks of amateur melodrama, and cringing “brotherly-love”.

The film’s other lead, Paul Walker, roams around like Bashful from the Seven Dwarves - bumbling through a god-awful script, and smirking like a lobotomised CK model.

And where is this dramatic move away from the previous films that I was told about? Fast 5 is just like all the others: flimsy, ridiculous plotlines, with shiny cars, shiny girls, and shiny muscles. The whole franchise is like a formula made up by Nuts magazine: naked girls + expensive super cars + bewildering images = gullible audiences.

Apart from the acting, the story, the script, the music, the locations, and every other important part of filmmaking, Fast and Furious 5 is an AMAZING movie. It’s like Citizen Kane meets The French Connection, only miles better (!)

The Apartment (1960)

“It’s brilliant…filmwise”

Flawless comedy starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine, about a lowly office worker (Lemmon) who allows his superiors at work to use his apartment for their secret affairs.

Lemmon plays C. C. Baxter, an eager-to-please pencil-pusher, whose private life is being ruined by his bosses, who are constantly taking advantage of him. Pushing Baxter out of his apartment at all hours of the day or night, drinking all his booze, and causing him to have the reputation of a scallywag with his neighbours, Baxter only continues with this horrendous“working relationship” in order to further his own career.

Conflict strikes though, when Baxter falls for a spunky elevator girl called Fran (MacLaine), who is having an affair with one of Baxter’s bosses…in Baxter’s apartment! As Baxter toes the line between flexible employee and friend to Fran, his apartment becomes the battle ground for an all-out drama.

Wonderfully witty and superbly scripted, The Apartment is a true comedy classic. Whilst the jokes are delivered with a sophisticated sharpness, there is a strong undercurrent of tragedy emanating from the two central characters. Baxter’s predicament leaves him dangerously depressed, whilst Fran’s complicated affair becomes the film’s most poignant storyline.

Unforgettably brilliant.

Prometheus (2012)

Ridley Scott and Noomi Rapace talk about the sci-fi film of the year.

For anyone who remembers the alien exploding out of John Hurt’s chest, or Harrison Ford terminating replicants, Ridley Scott will need no introduction. The man is a living legend amongst the film world, having directed some of the most influential movies of all time (see Blade Runner, Alien, Robin Hood, Thelma and Louise etc). This year sees the return of Scott to the enduring world of science-fiction, with a new crew, a new leading lady, and a new ship, namely: Prometheus.

“I loved going back to science fiction and I really loved being in the studio too,” says Scott “I hadn’t done a studio film for a while because Robin Hood was almost entirely shot on location and I really loved being in the studio for Prometheus. It all went very well indeed and I’m very happy with the result.” Having been released on June 1st, the wait is very much over, but the excitement continues at cinemas across London, and the world. The film follows the journey of a scientific crew, aboard the aforementioned ship, going in search of answers to the universe, only to come across a terrifying alien threat. The film tackles some weighty scientific notions and themes, as Scott reveals:

“We’re exploring some big ideas here. For us to be sitting here now had to have so many elements occur in the right way over the millennia, three billion years or so, and for that to happen, was some entity…involved? So the question becomes ‘God or not God?’. Or are we simply a Petri dish? And if we’re a Petri dish, we’re a Petri dish of something. If we are a Petri dish of something, who was that? It’s much larger than we are.”

Whilst Scott’s return to science-fiction was heavily desired amongst film fans, there are similarities between Prometheus and some of his earlier films. One of which comes in the form of Swedish actress, Noomi Rapace, playing the Scott-style leading woman. Rapace talks about the influence Scott had on her personally, “I remember when I saw Thelma and Louise and I was so young, I was like, ‘Oh, what is this? I’ve never seen anything like this.’ I was 12 or something. I think it’s incredible how he works.” She continues, “He has a very clear vision but at the same time he’s very open and if I would come up with a better idea, he would say, ‘Well, yeah, let’s try that’. It’s like we were creating something together every day and that was just amazing to be part of.”

This camaraderie forms an important part of the film, and the bonding between the actors is clear to see. “Ridley found a fantastic mix of people for this project and it was pure joy to work with them because they are amazing actors.” Says Rapace, “We did a lot of ad-lib and every scene came to life with this amazing group of people. I certainly don’t see myself as the lead. You know ‘here comes the lead and this is my scene.’ It wasn’t like that. It was very much what we all created together. There was Idris Elba and Michael (Fassbender), who are both fantastic, and I felt very lucky because I was surrounded by people who are just amazing, incredible actors.”

Indeed, the performances in Prometheus rival any of Scott’s previous films, including the notorious portrayal of lead woman Ripley (of the Alien films) by Sigourney Weaver. Rapace takes on the lead role of Elizabeth Shaw, a woman dedicated to faith as much as science, and commented on the differences/similarities between her and Ripley; “I think Shaw is more feminine in a way. She’s a scientist, an archaeologist. I think that Ripley was, in a way, harder from the start and from the beginning and she was a loner. Shaw starts this journey with Holloway [Logan Marshall-Green] and she loves him. They’re a team and they’re doing this thing together. In the middle of the movie, something happens and she becomes harder, more like a warrior. She has to cut off some emotional attachments to be able to survive.”

Aside from the great performances, there is also the great lengths which Ridley Scott is famous for embracing, in order to achieve a brilliant movie.

He said, “I like to build sets and reproduce as much as I can because it’s there; it’s something real for the actors to work with. And ironically, it turns out to be more economic. Everything I did was more economic. I’ve watched these other films that are clocking up around the sky, which is ridiculous and I don‘t know how that happens. I think it happens through indecision and it also happens when you don‘t know what your story is, and you shoot before you have a script and you are making it up on the spot and the you digitally try and fix it afterwards and then you realize you haven’t got it, and you come back and you have to re-shoot again. We knew exactly what we wanted. Absolutely, I had it locked down.”

This definitive view of how the film would ultimately look is what separates an artistic director like Scott from others. The precision in his techniques and the confidence in his choices keep the film from being sloppy, and instead, a vivid and compelling action/horror. One choice he made was a constant source of trepidation for fans, shooting Prometheus in 3D.

“3D is absolutely right for Prometheus. It’s straight-forward and simple and it enhances the spectacle, there’s no doubt about that. And it was simple partly because of the cameraman that we used, Dariusz Wolski who was just great. I had the best time with Dariusz. He had done one 3D movie before, the last Pirates of the Caribbean film (On Stranger Tides) and I said to him ‘I think we should shoot it in 3D because this film lends itself to it.’ and he said ‘yes I agree.’ Everyone was very wary about how much extra we would throw at it because of 3D but it didn’t happen.”

The result is phenomenal, bringing together some of the most loved aspects of Scott’s previous films and presenting them in an enduringly contemporary way.

Killer Joe (2011)

“Finger-Licking Good”

Based on the play by Tracy Letts, Killer Joe is a wonderful exploration of greed, loyalty and violence.

Matthew McConaughey plays the title role of Joe Cooper, a detective who moonlights as a contract killer. Joe is hired by Chris Smith (Emile Hirsch) to kill his alcoholic, abandoning mother, after Chris learns that his mum has a fifty-thousand dollar life insurance policy, which, in the event of her death, will go to her seemingly frail daughter Dottie (Juno temple).

Chris and his amazingly useless dad Ansel (Thomas Haden Church) are unable to stump up Joe’s twenty-five-thousand dollar fee up front, so they allow Joe to keep Dottie as a retainer, until after the money is collected and Joe is paid. Joe’s interest in Dottie seems lascivious, as he robs her of her virginity, and makes himself perfectly at home in the Smith’s trailer, although becomes somewhat of the lover/father-figure she desperately needs. Dottie’s reaction is not one of pure hatred, she soon falls for “Killer” Joe’s charms, and finds herself pulled away from her family.

As Joe’s effect on the whole family, including Ansel’s new wife Sharla (Gina Gershon) becomes increasingly entrenched, we see the Smith’s pull each other apart whilst heralding Joe as some kind of superior being.

A fantastically scripted film, the story’s foundation as a play is obvious, letting these character engage so frantically as the central device of the movie. Characters are given their separate motivations, which all seem to conflict with one another, creating the havoc which escalates towards a final, brutal encounter.

Brilliant performances, in particular McConaughey who provides such a compellingly seedy character, stealing most of the scenes whilst engaging in some of the more disturbing ones (in particular a sequence between Joe and Sharla with a piece of fried chicken!).

Dark, humorous, and audaciously plotted, Killer Joe is a spectacular feat of character-driven drama.

The Hunger Games (2012)

Shooting Straight

Popular books seem to be increasingly ending up as movie franchises. In recent years the likes of The Twilight Saga, the Millennium series (that’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo for those out of the loop), and Jason Bourne have all graced our screens, with varying degrees of success. Now, The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins looks set for a three-film deal, and if the first instalment is anything to go by, it should be fantastic.

Jennifer Lawrence plays the film’s central character, Katniss Everdeen - a talented survivor-type, whose life amongst an impoverished district has taught her to be self-reliant, and deadly with a bow-and-arrow.

Katniss lives in District 12, in a world controlled by a centralised governing body, known as the Capitol. The Capitol controls all 12 of the districts with a harsh hand, in order to prevent any kind of uprising. One of the Capitol’s methods is to hold the annual Hunger Games - an event whereby two “tributes” from every district, one boy and one girl, must fight to the death in an arena filled with weapons, booby-traps and limited resources.

During the annual “reaping”, the process in which the tributes names are drawn for the games, Katniss’ younger sister Prim is chosen. Seeing her helpless sibling struggle to the stage, Katniss offers herself as tribute, in place of her sister.

What ensues is a violent, desperate attempt by Katniss to stay alive in the arena, whilst trying to figure out if her fellow district-12 tribute Peeta, is a enemy or ally.

An excellent story done justice by director Gary Ross - who stays fundamentally true to the plot. Minimal changes have been made, and the only substantial criticism, one that seems to follow any book-into-film adaptation, is that not enough time is given to certain events.

That being said, The Hunger Games movie is a genuinely thrilling and exciting film. Lawrence’s performance is excellent, coping with plenty of solo screen time whilst adding levels of pathos to her troubles character. The fighting is daringly violent, it could so easily have taken the path less gory, which gives the film a far more adult atmosphere.

A spectacular sci-fi/thriller, introducing audiences to what should be a spectacular show.

Brave (2012)

Pixar’s Plucky Princess

Now that the novelty of animated mega-busters has worn off, animation studios are having to find new ways to charm audiences back into the cinemas. Without remaking a classic family hit (like Toy Story or Monsters Inc), they seem to be on nervous ground when it comes to a new adventure. However, Brave is a beautifully crafted, brilliantly formed movie that recaptures the essence of animated films, and brings a much needed sense of vitality.

Set in the sprightly highlands of Scotland, a royal family looses their land to chaos when their princess daughter decides to throw tradition into the wind by not marrying a suitor of their choosing. Merida (voiced by Kelly Macdonald) is a feisty tomboy with flaming red hair, who would rather be out shooting a bow and arrow, than acting princess-like. However, after spurning her family and running off into the forest, she encounters a witch who grants Merida wish - which turns out to be a curse.

Brave’s charm lies in its authentic take on this picturesque, Scottish landscape, with sweeping coverage of the rolling hills, and the rousing music adding depth to the storyline. Voices are from genuine Scots (no Shrek’s here), and seem to have a genuine chemistry during the film. Macdonald is joined by the likes of Billy Connolly, Emma Thompson, Julie Walters, and Robbie Coltraine, all of whom deliver great enthusiasm to their eclectic characters.

Up there with the best of Pixar’s productions, Brave is a wonderful addition to the animated success stories.

The Raid (2012)

Snap, Crackle, and Pop

Pegged as one of the best action movies in decades, The Raid is an intensely gripping hand-to-hand combat film with teeth-clenching fight scenes and an unrelenting stamina.

The plot is brilliantly simple - a SWAT team enter a multi-storey tenement building, which is the base for a dangerous crime lord, in an attempt to bring him down. Once inside though, the cops are ambushed by the hordes of criminals who inhabit the building, and find themselves in a war zone as they attempt to continue their mission/get out alive.

Fans of action movies need to see this film to see what kind of calibre is still being made. Yes, the film is in Indonesian (with English subtitles), but this only adds gravitas to the effect. The choreography is out of this world, seamlessly moving between struggles between cops and baddies without the usual endless cuts, and the brutal nature of the fighting will unnerve even the most seasoned action aficionado.

Character development is only briefly hinted at, which, instead of leaving the film feeling shallow, gives the atmosphere fear a more deadly effect.

As far as world cinema goes, this is an outstanding achievement. A film that manages not only to survive amongst the already brimming genre, but raises the standard across the board.

The Labyrinth (1986)

Who knew Bowie could be so evil?

A true eighties fantasy, starring David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly about a magical world of Goblins, mazes, and some eerie crystal balls.

Fifteen-year-old Sarah (Connelly) finds herself thrown into an extraordinary and perilous world after wishing her baby brother away, when he won’t stop crying. Cast into the world of the Goblins, she must find a way through the evil king’s labyrinth within thirteen hours, otherwise her baby brother will be turned into a Goblin himself.

A children’s film at heart, there is a nostalgic quality to a film like this that will appeal to viewers of all ages. The effort that went into to building these epic sets, and the wondrous make-up effects used on all the different inhabitants of this world, is astounding, and the result still holds up today.

Of course, there are the inevitable elements of the film which have not dated so well - such as Bowie breaking into song, or the clumsy narrative which becomes tiring as the movie progresses. But, overall, these factors can easily be looked over if you get yourself into the spirit of this fantastical storytelling, and just enjoy the pure imagination on show.

For the child within, who never gave up believing.

Friends With Kids (2011)

Friends without benefits

From the makers of Bridesmaids (2011), comes this Rom-Com about two friends who decide to raise a child together - without any of the romantic complications.

Jennifer Westfeldt and Adam Scott play Julie and Jason, two BFFs, whose search for the right partner has yielded little so far in their lives. Having both decided they want kids, at some point in their life, and tired of watching all of their coupled friends fawn over their offspring, the two thirty-something urban professionals, decide to have one together, and have joint custody whilst they both search for their perfect partner. Sound strange?

What ensues is a slightly predictable, yet emotionally charged story about two people finding what they want in life. Padded with the differing experiences of the couples around them: from the married pair who are always moaning but love their kids dearly, to the couple who used to enjoy a fully active sex life, and now seem to have nothing to say to each other.

Despite a somewhat flimsy foundation, Friends With Kids benefits from a great cast of funny people, who swarm around plenty of adulthood-related topics with sharp tongues and a proclivity to embarrass themselves (such as Scott being literally rained upon with his son’s faeces).