Playing Catch-Up With The Films of 2017: Churchill (dir by Jonathan Teplitzky)

Posted on December 25, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

2017 is shaping up to be the year of films about Winston Churchill.

For instance, Dunkirk has been an Oscar front-runner ever since it was released last summer. Winston Churchill does not actually appear in Dunkirk but his shadow hangs over the entire film. Whenever Mark Rylance says that he’s doing what the prime minister requested him to do, we know that he’s talking about Winston Churchill.

Darkest Hour, which I hope to see this week, features Gary Oldman in the role of Churchill. For most of the year, a lot of people (like me) assumed that Darkest Hour would be a definite best picture nominee and a probable winner. While the film seems to have lost a little of its luster, everyone still seems to agree that Gary Oldman is not only going to be nominated by best actor but that he also has a pretty chance of finally winning.

However, before either of those films were released, there was Churchill. Chuchill received a very limited release in June. It starred Brian Cox in the title role and it took place in the days leading up to D-Day. It follows Churchill as he struggles with self-doubt. He is haunted by nightmares about the men he lost while a military commander in 1915. He worries that he is being marginalized by the Americans (represented by John Slattery in the role of Dwight D. Eisenhower). He worries that if he authorizes the invasion of Normandy, he’ll run the risk of losing whatever prestige he has left. What if the invasion ends in disaster?

That question right there is the main problem with Churchill. If you know anything about history, you know that the invasion of Normandy was a victory for the Allies, albeit a costly one. Therefore, for this film to maintain any sort of suspense about what ‘s going to happen, it has to be viewed by people who don’t know about history. But people who don’t care about history probably won’t be interested in watching a somewhat stuffy film about Winston Churchill.

Despite a few surrealistic nightmare sequences, Churchill ultimately feels like it belongs more on PBS than a movie screen. It doesn’t surprise me to learn that the majority of director Jonathan Treplitzky’s work has been for British television because Churchill really does feel like a heavily edited version of a 6-hour miniseries. You watch and you’re impressed by the production values and some of the performances but you find yourself wondering if certain have scenes have been cut out. If Churchill had been made for HBO, I imagine that Brian Cox and Miranda Richardson (as Churchill’s wife) would be Emmy front-runners. But, as a feature film, it feels like a decidedly minor portrayal of a major figure.

One final note: all films about the British government during World War II are required to feature at least one scene with King George VI. Colin Firth, in The King’s Speech, remains the best George. Laurence Fox in W.E. was the worst. In Churchill, King George VI is played by James Purefoy. He doesn’t have a big role but he does a good job with it. To be honest, I wish that his role had been bigger because he and Cox are entertaining to watch when they’re acting opposite each other.

Playing Catch-Up: The Accountant, Carnage Park, The Choice, The Legend of Tarzan

Posted on January 18, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Continuing my look back at the films of 2016, here are four mini-reviews of some films that really didn’t make enough of an impression to demand a full review.

The Accountant (dir by Gavin O’Connor)

2016 was a mixed year for Ben Affleck. Batman v. Superman may have been a box office success but it was also such a critical disaster that it may have done more harm to Affleck’s legacy than good. If nothing else, Affleck will spend the rest of his life being subjected to jokes about Martha. While Ben’s younger brother has become an Oscar front runner as a result of his performance in Manchester By The Sea, Ben’s latest Oscar effort, Live By Night, has been released to critical scorn and audience indifference.

At the same time, Ben Affleck also gave perhaps his best performance ever in The Accountant. Affleck plays an autistic accountant who exclusively works for criminals and who has been raised to be an expert in all forms of self-defense. The film’s plot is overly complicated and director Gavin O’Connor struggles to maintain a consistent tone but Affleck gives a really great performance and Anna Kendrick reminds audiences that she’s capable of more than just starring in the Pitch Perfect franchise.

Carnage Park (dir by Mickey Keating)

I really wanted to like Carnage Park, because it was specifically advertised as being an homage to the grindhouse films of the 1970s and y’all know how much I love those! Ashley Bell plays a woman who gets kidnapped twice, once by two bank robbers and then by a psycho named Wyatt (Pat Healy). Healy chases Bell through the desert, hunting her Most Dangerous Game-style. There are some intense scenes and both Bell and Healy are well-cast but, ultimately, it’s just kind of blah.

The Choice (dir by Ross Katz)

The Choice was last year’s Nicholas Sparks adaptation. It came out, as all Nichols Sparks adaptations do, just in time for Valentine’s Day and it got reviews that were so negative that a lot of people will never admit that they actually saw it. Benjamin Walker and Teresa Palmer play two people who meet, fall in love, and marry in North Carolina. But then Palmer is in a car accident, ends up in a coma, and Walker has to decide whether or not to turn off the life support.

As I said, The Choice got terrible reviews and it’s certainly not subtle movie but it’s actually better than a lot of films adapted from the work of Nicholas Sparks. Walker and Palmer are a likable couple and, at the very least, The Choice deserves some credit for having the courage not to embrace the currently trendy cause of euthanasia. That alone makes The Choice better than Me Before You.

The Legend of Tarzan (dir by David Yates)

Alexander Skarsgard looks good without his shirt on and Samuel L. Jackson is always a fun to watch and that’s really all that matters as far as The Legend of Tarzan is concerned. It’s an enjoyable enough adventure film but you won’t remember much about it afterward. Christoph Waltz is a good actor but he’s played so many villains that it’s hard to get excited over it anymore.

Embracing the Melodrama Part II #117: Never Let Me Go (dir by Mark Romanek)

Posted on June 15, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I can still remember, back in the year 2010, when I first saw Never Let Me Go at the Dallas Angelika. Going into the film, I didn’t really know what was waiting for me. I hadn’t read the novel that it was based on. All I knew was that it had a cool trailer and it starred two of my favorite actresses, Carey Mulligan and Keira Knightley. Before I watched Never Let Me Go, I didn’t even know who Andrew Garfield was but that changed quickly. Never Let Me Go took me by surprise. I figured it would be a sad movie, based on the melancholy trailer and title. But I had no idea how sad or effective it would be. By the end of the movie, I was in tears.

And, even though I was already writing for this site at the time, I somehow never wrote up a review of Never Let Me Go. Oh, I certainly meant to. I went out of my way to recommend the movie on twitter. I included it on my list of films that deserved Oscar consideration. But I never actually got around to writing that full review. The emotions were just too overwhelming.

Well, I’m going to use this opportunity to recommend that, if you haven’t already, you make an effort to see Never Let Me Go. It’s a beautifully done film, one that confirms that director Mark Romanek is a major talent who really should have more than just three feature films to his credit. (True, he does have a lot of music videos…) As well, the film was written by Alex Garland, which should interest those of you who fell in love with Ex Machina earlier this year.

As for the film itself, it takes place in a world where, we’re told, a medical breakthrough was discovered in 1952 that allows people to live to be over 100 years old. The details of that medical breakthrough are slowly revealed to us over the course of the film. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to really talk about this film without revealing those details so consider this to be your SPOILER WARNING.

Basically — much as in Clonus — life has been extended through the use of cloning. Cloned children are raised outside of the view of “normal” society. They go to special schools. And when they turn 18, they are harvested for their organs. Clones are told that their ultimate goal is to “complete,” which is a polite way to say that most of them die before they ever reach 30. A few lucky ones are allowed to be “carers.” They take care of and comfort dying clones and, as a result, they get to put off their first organ donation for a few years.

Unlike Clonus, where the cloning was clandestine and done only to benefit the very rich, the clones are not a secret in Never Let Me Go. Everyone knows why they exist and everyone knows what is going to ultimately happen to them. Whenever the clones are allowed to leave their schools and explore the real world, they are greeted with a mix of hostility, fear, and guilt. Because they are due to be sacrificed, society chooses to believe that the clones are somehow less than human.

As for the clones, the majority of them accept their fate. You watch Never Let Me Go and you keep waiting for some sort of revolution and it never comes. Some of the clones are angry. Many of them desperately believe that there’s some way that they can avoid having to give up their organs. A good deal of the film is spent listening to people you’ve come to love talk about getting a “deferral” that the audience knows does not exist. For the most part, though, the clones passively accept their fate because that’s what they’ve been raised to do.

The film itself follows three clones from their childhood to their completion. Kathy (Carey Mulligan) is a carer. Ruth (Keira Knightley) starts out as a snob but softens as her fate becomes more and more inevitable. And, lastly, there’s Tommy (Andrew Garfield). Tommy starts out as an awkward young boy and he grows up to be an awkward young man. Of all of them, Tommy is the most convinced that, as a result of the artwork he innocently drew as a boy, he will somehow be given a deferment. Garfield is so heartbreaking in this role. When he finally snaps and screams in frustration, you scream with him.

Never Let Me Go is not an easy film to watch but it’s one that I highly recommend. It’ll make you think and it’ll make you cry. And after you watch the movie, read Kazuo Ishiguro’s wonderful novel. It’s even more heart-breaking than the movie.

Trailer: Kick-Ass 2 (Extended Red Band)

Posted on July 21, 2013 by Arleigh

This past week saw the largest collection of nerd, geek and comic book fandom gathered in one magical place. The place in question is San Diego and the event is called San Diego Comic-Con or simply just uttered in awed whispers as Comic-Con. It is a place that many outsiders have shunned as a place that has no place in good, normal society yet they continue to arrive in larger numbers to ply their products to those they shun. Even this blog has it’s shamers and ignorant individuals who spew insults yet they too continue to visit because deep in their subconscious they know, like those who ridicule Comic-Con and those who attend them with a passion, that they’re the ones out of step with whats not accepted in society.

What does this mean when it comes to the latest trailer for Kick-Ass 2 that just came out of Comic-Con?

Absolutely nothing other than the trailer and the film itself is just another weird meeting of the two cultures. It’s a film that celebrates the ridiculousness and absurdity of the comic book culture, yet it’s one that’s funded by the very same people who insulted the scene just a decade ago.

The first film was a revelation and helped introduced the world to one Chloe Grace Moretz, but it also showed that comic books and films made from them didn’t have to be PG or even PG-13. There was a place for ultra-violence in our comic book films. It also helped bring the name of Matthew Vaughn into the forefront of comic book fandom. While he’s not directing this sequel (he elected to go with X-Men: First Class and we’re all the better for it), he did help in bringing it to life and hand-picked his successor in Jeff Wadlow.

While Kick-Ass 2 is not getting the same sort of buzz from Comic-Con the original film did it is still one film I’m quite interested in seeing just to find out what has happened to our young superheroes and vigilante crime fighters since the last film. Plus, it’s main villain likes to call himself “Motherfucker”.

Trailer: Kick-Ass 2 (Red Band)

Posted on March 14, 2013 by Arleigh

2010’s Kick-Ass was one of those films that you either loved or hated. It was a film adapted from the Mark Millar and John Romita, Jr. comic book of the same name that also had a similar reputation of having extreme opposites in regards to how people perceived it.

I, for one, loved the film despite just being “meh” when it came to the comic. Where the film by Matthew Vaughn was a darkly comic deconstruction of the superhero story the comic book that gave birth to it was just an exercise in shocking the readers without working for it. Yet, despite that the film was a hit with both the fans of the comic book and those who didn’t even know it was a comic book. That popularity allowed the film to make enough profit that a sequel was greenlit even before a second volume of the comic book was even started by Millar and Romita, Jr.

Kick-Ass 2 sees the return of both Hit-Girl and Kick-Ass with Red Mist now calling himself The Motherfucker and the film’s main antagonist. The sequel sees Matthew Vaughn return as producer with Jeff Wadlow stepping in as director.

Kick-Ass 2 is set for an August 16, 2013 North American release date with the film premiering earlier on July 19, 2013 in the UK.

Lisa Marie Deals With Intruders (dir. by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo)

Posted on April 19, 2012 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier this month, I saw Intruders, the latest film from director Juan Carlo Fresnadillo. Spanish horror films are currently the trendy genre to love and Intruders has everything that we’ve come to expect from Spanish horror: creepy children, gothic atmosphere, claustrophobic staging, ineffectual representatives of the Church, and a feeling that the society of the present is held hostage by the sins of the past.

Intruders tells two parallel stories about two children who are haunted by a malevolent, faceless spirit known as Hollowface. Hollowface comes out at night and searches for a new face (and who can blame him, really?). As the film opens, he is haunting a young boy (Izan Corchero) and his mother (Pilar Lopez de Ayala) in Spain. The boy deals with his fear of Hollowface by writing a lengthy story about him. Meanwhile, in England, 12 year-old Mia (Ella Purnell) finds a copy of the boy’s story in an empty tree stump and reads it aloud. Shortly after doing this, she starts to see Hollowface in the shadows of her bedroom. The only person who believes her is her father (played by Clive Owen). The film proceeds to cut back-and-forth between these two haunted children until finally, in its final few minutes, the two stories come together.

Intruders starts out strong but then quickly starts to fall apart. As a malevolent force, Hollowface is effective as long as he’s just a shadowy figure floating through childish nightmares but, as the film progresses, he becomes less and less intimidating until finally he’s just another poorly defined villain in a costume. By that same token, Fresnadillo’s direction is nicely atmospheric and creepy during the first half of the film but then, as the two parallel stories come together, the film starts to feel more and more generic. The two stories are, of course, linked together by a big twist. Oddly enough, even though I managed to guess the twist, it still felt like it came out of close-to-nowhere.

That said, Intruders isn’t a disaster. The film is fairly well-acted (especially by Clive Owen, who in a perfect world would be playing James Bond in Skyfall) and even once the narrative falls apart, Fresnadillo still comes up with the occasional effective shock. Even if I wasn’t familiar with Fresnadillo’s previous films, I would probably take a chance on his next movie.

Just as long as it’s not The Return of Hollowface or anything like that.