Tag / review

by hutchwp

Film review – Absolute Beginners (Julien Temple, 1986)

Panned on its original release and a complete commercial failure [1], Julian Temple’s musical Absolute Beginners is a film that is often cited as the cause of a partial collapse of the British film industry. Looking at it with fresh eyes, the criticisms are undoubtedly harsh, but the film still has too many flaws to warrant anything more than cult status.

The musical charts the on-off romantic relationship between aspiring model Crepe Suzette (Patsy Kensit) and unestablished photographer Colin (Eddie O’Connell) as they try to make their way in 1950s London. Weaving elements of gang warfare, race riots and youth culture in a way that is almost brilliant, but largely incoherent.

It wuzza strange casting choice

The film starts with the familiar sound of David Bowie’s title track, which was a global hit at the time and proved to be one of his most enduring songs. If, like me, you were made aware of it solely because David Bowie has a named role in the film, then prepare to feel shortchanged. Bowie stars as Vendice Partners, a sales and marketing man who first appears about halfway through the film. By all accounts, his prominence in the film was more a marketing choice than an artistic choice, but his scenes breathe life into a stagnant portion of the film as it threatens to grind to a halt.

Temple was famed for his music videos and by the time this film was released he’d been responsible for some of the most celebrated music videos of the 1980s, including efforts for the likes of The Beat, Culture Club, The Sex Pistols, Depeche Mode, The Kinks and Sade. Some of the best moments in Absolute Beginners are the standalone tracks that could be lifted straight out of the film and placed on MTV. The two best examples are Ray Davies’s ‘Quiet Life’ and David Bowie’s ‘That’s Motivation’, the latter of which has Bowie tap dancing around a giant typewriter.

The film’s lack of focus is its downfall. When Colin gets caught up in the Notting Hill race riots in the final third of the film, he takes a wrong turn to avoid danger and ends up in a neo-Nazi war rally. This is a scene that creates some really powerful imagery but the themes had been underplayed in the build up, making its inclusion neither relevant nor integral to the plot. Indeed, the threat of violence is imminent all around the city without ever feeling anything more than a light touch suggestion. Yes, it’s a musical, but I can’t help think that if they’d just cut a couple of needless scenes earlier in the film there could have been a better balance struck between the romantic side and the social commentary. It is hard to believe that the die-hard fans of the book don’t feel the same way.

It was a troubled film to develop and the brilliant 53-minute documentary now included in the Blu-ray release is enough justification to pick up a copy. It’s also a curiosity for fans of any of the stars in this bizarrely-assembled cast. It is, however, not a good piece of cinema.

[1] Absolute Beginners took £1.8m at the box office in the UK and $930k in the USA against a budget of £8.4m.

by hutchwp

Game review – Hotdog Hurdles (Tom Santoro, 2016)

I’ve just lost another hour of my life. This is becoming a huge problem. I lost two last night as well. I can’t help myself. Just. One. More. Go.

Addiction is a very serious thing, but it’s something that Hotdog Hurdles, the debut game by self-professed nerd Tom Santoro, is happy to embrace and encourage . As with many mobile apps, the beauty of the game is in its simplicity.

Initially, you play as a simply-drawn hotdog called Frank. The aim of the game is to not die as you jump over hurdles at a surprisingly well-attended athletics tournament. Every time you land a jump, you run faster and faster. You will fail, no question. It is a game of delaying the inevitable.

There is a strange hierarchy involved in the status of the fast food you can run as. Starting as Frank, you progress to Pops the Popcorn, Soda the Soft Drink, Angus the Hamburger and finally, the king of all fast foods, Don the Donut. A typical meal out then. These are earned by cashing in money earned on runs or through logging in on consecutive days.

Donuts are surprisingly good runners

Everyone watching on is a human, presumably salivating at the tasty food on offer whilst hoping that each item doesn’t burn too much fat through exercise (think about that for a few minutes…).

It is an infinite runner and some people won’t like that, but as they go this is potentially one of the best on the market. All you have to do is beat your own high score (mine stands at a terrible 21, the world record is 34) or the score of your friends through the Apple Game Centre (it is currently an Apple-exclusive).

You get nothing for your efforts, not even a thank you. You just get more failure. But yet you click the play button.

In a world where there’s quite a lot to think about and get sad or angry about, something like Hotdog Hurdles is just what we need.

Hotdog Hurdles is available to download now from the App Store.

by hutchwp

Bowie Berlin Tours

I recently enjoyed a brief holiday in the capital of Germany, Berlin. The city is rich with modern history and everywhere you look there’s a potential point of interest. I can honestly say it was one of the most educational and enriching holidays I’ve ever been on.

No discussion of the political landscape of Berlin over the last 100 years would be complete without mention of the music scene that grew organically within the city from the late 1970s onwards that produced some of the greatest works of the era, inspired by the unique make-up of a city split in two and equally inspiring those living there. It is a music scene that also arguably helped to bring down the wall (or factually if you are the German Foreign Office).

Spearheading the scene was David Bowie, who in 1976 was out of money and keen to break away from the LA drug scene that had facilitated his addiction to cocaine. It was there that he famously completed his ‘Berlin Trilogy’: Low, “Heroes” and Lodger [1], which kickstarted his career and helped him on his road to recovery.

If you’re in Berlin and have an interest in David Bowie the you’ll definitely want to make sure you sign up to the Berlin Bowie Walk, operated by the Berlin Music Tours company. For a relatively small fee you will be guided around the famous city for around three hours, taking in the outside of the famous Hansa Studios (where he recorded throughout his time there); Potsdamer Platz (you can now get the train there!); the Brandenburg Gate; the Reichstag, which was the site of his famous 1987 performance; and his flat in Schöneberg.

If you’re feeling especially adventurous, you can return on a second day and visit the inside of Hansa Studio, standing in the Hall by the Wall and looking out from the former control studio through the window from the same spot Bowie where famously wrote the lyrics to “Heroes” – the precise details of which were debated by the many Bowie übergeeks during my tour.

I’ve been purposefully scant on the details of the tour because I don’t want to ruin your enjoyment, but both sessions were truly special experiences and brought me closer to one of my favourite artists.

The studio tour was actually Depeche Mode focused, but that wasn’t a huge problem. In fact, it was great to be able to learn a lot about a band that are surprisingly famous outside the UK. They recorded most of their most successful music at Hansa and this was clearly a pilgramage for many of those on the tour. They run several tours that are focused on different artists, including U2 and David Bowie. Sadly as yet Lou Bega hasn’t been given a tour yet [2].

If I have one recommendation it’s that both tours overran on their expected finish time. This meant we got great value for money each day but if you have something else booked in (for example a visit to the Reichstag) then you should leave at least two hours at the end of the tour to do your next activity. On the walking tour you end up at Café Neues Ufer, which was a former favourite spot of Bowie and Iggy Pop to drink in – we ended up spending over two hours in there and didn’t want to leave!

These tours are excellent value for money and packed full of anecdotes from people who are passionate about their subject. When that subject is David Bowie, it’s a no-brainer!

[1] The trilogy is often referred to as such despite Low being written prior to Bowie’s arrival in Berlin and Lodger actually being recorded in Switzerland.

[2] Lou Bega recorded his infamous ‘Mambo No. 5’ track in the late 1990s with some of the producers who now work at Hansa, a fact recognised by the double-platinum proudly on display in the lobby area of the studio.

by hutchwp

BFI London Film Festival 2016 – First weekend review

I’ve had a fantastic time over the first week of the BFI London Film Festival. I’ve laughed, cried, been angry and been confused by a rich plethora of cinematic delights.

Here is a link to all the films I’ve managed to catch so far:

A United Kingdom
La La Land
Frantz
Dancer
Creepy
Psychonauts: The Forgotten Children
Queen of Katwe

Here’s to the second week of the festival!

by hutchwp

Film review – Frantz (François Ozon, 2016)

Set primarily in Germany in the immediate aftermath of the First World War, François Ozon’s latest film is an emotional story portrayed almost entirely in black and white. It revolves around Anna (Paula Beer), a woman who is living with the parents of her lost lover and supporting each other in their collective grief. That man is the titular Frantz (Anton von Lucke), who we learn has lost his life in battle during the war. When a Frenchman by the name of Adrien (Pierre Niney) shows up at Frantz’s grave to give his respects, he tells them of his close friendship to their mutually lost friend.

Adrien (Niney) and Anna (Beer)

Ozon is something of a prolific filmmaker on almost the same level as Woody Allen. Since his celebrated debut feature length film Sitcom in 1998, he has written and directed sixteen films, amongst them the critically acclaimed Swimming Pool and the highly successful Potiche. Yet Frantz is, by all accounts, a departure in style for him and sees him in relatively unfamiliar territory with a historical war drama.

It is based on the play ‘L’homme que j’ai tué’ by Maurice Rostand. Before writing his script, Ozon was unaware that the play had already been adapted by legendary filmmaker Ernst Lubitsch as the film Broken Lullaby in 1931, though when he watched the film he realised that it was a completely different treatment to the direction he wanted to go with Frantz. He wanted to give the focus of the film to Anna, who was on the losing side of the war, providing more empathy to her as the central character.

There is an interesting chemistry between Beer and Niney, both of whom are playing extremely complex characters. They share this individual that has had a huge affect on their respective lives and begin to grow closer. Providing convincing characterisations of such  conflicting emotions is a challenge both rise to and it is this that elevates the film above being a wartime drama.

It was amazing to learn that this was Beer’s first performance acting as a French-language character. Many successful actresses couldn’t achieve what she has here in their first language let alone their second one. She revealed in a post-screening discussion that she had to learn and develop the script twice. Initially she developed the emotional responses to the words in her native German, before relearning the entire segments in French to ensure her delivery wasn’t lacklustre.

This is a truly moving film that gives an interesting point of view to the fallout from war that hasn’t often been explored before. Superb delivery from the two complex central characters means this comes highly recommended.

by hutchwp

Film review – Dancer (Steven Cantor, 2016)

Documentary filmmaker Steven Cantor’s latest cross-examination comes in the form of Dancer, which tells the story of Ukrainian ballet dancer Sergei Polunin, who in 2010 became the youngest man to become the British Royal Ballet’s leading principal.

Sergei Polunin dances to Hozier

The film uses talking heads interviews blended with some exclusive home video footage to creature a portrait of a fragile artist. Polunin is shown as a man who knows little outside his art and is desperate to change the future for upcoming ballet dancers who he fears will make the same mistakes as he did. These mistakes led to him quitting the British Royal Ballet Feeling at the tender age of twenty-two, shocking the ballet world and disappointing his fans.

Most insightful are the interviews with his mother and father. Clearly huge sacrifices were made throughout his life to get him to where he is now. The film leaves it open as to whether either of them regret putting him through it, and it’s not something that ever really needs an answer. He certainly has a different life to the one he would have had if he’d stayed in Khersan, Ukraine.

The focal point of the film comes in the form of the Dave LaChapelle-directed video that went viral earlier this year. I urge you to stop reading and watch the video below on the largest screen you can find.

This video has, at last count, been viewed 16.3m times in the last eight months. That is an astonishing amount, but then it is an astonishing piece of art. It was choreographed by Jade Hale-Christophi, a ballet dancer with Polunin met at the British Royal Ballet and one of his closest friends. The purpose of the film was to announce his retirement and have that as his “final dance”, but the response was so great he decided to change tact, and instead wants to do guest appearances and one-off pieces of art.

This is a crucial thing for him. The reason he has struggled throughout his career is a lack of time to step back, ask himself what he really wants, and make an informed decision about the next career choice.

He also spoke after the screening about where ballet’s David Beckham is. I suspect after that video and this film, he need only look in the mirror to find him.

A fascinating examination of a tortured artist now seemingly on the straight and narrow.

Dancer will receive a DVD release in April via Dogwoof.

by hutchwp

Film review – Psiconautas, Los Niños Olvidados / Psychonauts, The Forgotten Children (Alberto Vázquez & Pedro Rivero, 2016)

Somewhere deep inside me was a sworded hope that maybe, just maybe, a family was in the screening of Psiconautas at Prince Charles Theatre and had a truly miserable time watching one of the most bizarre 75 minutes of cinema I have ever seen. Harsh, I know, but variety is the spice of life and Trolls 3D sold out weeks ago despite being in every cinema across the land in about two weeks.

Sorry.. what just happened?

The plotline is a difficult one to nail down. Based on a graphic novel by Alberto Vazquez, its origins lie in a 2011 short film titled Birdboy. After a short prologue, we are introduced to our two main protagonists. The aforementioned Birdboy is a fatherless creature who can only function whilst under the influence of drugs. His former girlfriend Dinki – a mouse – is trapped in a life ruled by her religion-mad mother, her father (who isn’t a mouse but wears a mouse mask) and a half-man-half-dog brother called Jonathan who his parents adore. She longs to escape with her two friends, but doing so proves to be not so easy when they live on a distopian hell island and are being hunted down by hilarious sentient alarm clocks.

They meet other characters along the way, from a panicked rubber duck to the titular tribe of forgotten children. There is a sense that Vázquez and Rivero are bursting with ideas and this bodes well for future works.

I’m so confused.

It is a wholly confusing experience that had no intentions of letting the audience expect the expected. There were moments of real hilarity and moments of true horror – a real rollercoaster of bemusement. The climax is nothing short of terrifying.

If you like your animation to be all warm and fuzzy then clearly this isn’t for you. But if you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to get trapped inside a Stanley Donwood nightmare then there could well be something here for you.

by hutchwp

Film review – La La Land (Damien Chazelle, 2016)

WARNING: This review is effusively positive. If you’re a misery-guts then please look away now.

Every once in a while you will go into a film knowing almost nothing about what you’re going to see and get absolutely blown away by a surprisingly perfect masterpiece. As you get further into your film-watching life, enjoying these moments becomes increasingly rare, so when a film like ‘La La Land’ comes along, you can’t help but be overcome by giddy excitement.

Damien Chazelle shot to fame in 2014 with his critically acclaimed and rather special jazz-bully drama ‘Whiplash’. ‘La La Land’ shares very few similarities with it, bar an affinity to jazz that also featured prominently in his debut feature ‘Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench’. It does expand on a topic explored in ‘Whiplash’: the ongoing internal conflict of artists pursuing their dream at the expense of every other aspect of their life.

If you enjoyed his first two feature films but thought he couldn’t “do” mainstream, then prepare to be proven absolutely wrong seconds into the start. It opens with an over-the-top musical song and dance number set amidst a traffic jam. It’s an explosive one-shot (though there may have been some clever linking between extended shots) that received a round of applause at the end from an appreciative audience. Rightly so – it was jaw-dropping.

‘La La Land’ is, at heart, a homage to traditional musicals, with a joyful soundtrack matched by a couple of mesmerising performances from the lead performers Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. Gosling stars as Sebastian, a struggling jazz pianist going from poor gig to poor gig in LA, with dreams of owning his own jazz club to fend off the death of jazz. Stone is Mia, a young actress moonlighting as a barista at the Warner Brothers Studio sets who can’t get a break she deserves in the film industry. After a number of serendipitous meets, Seb and Mia start to fall for each other and, with both a figurative and a literal song and a dance, their romance explodes.

With Seb being a jazz expert/enthusiast/nerd and them both being performers, Chazelle has given himself the platform on which to produce a naturalistic musical that will doubtless make it more acceptable to those who don’t normally class themselves as musical fans. There is also evidence of a significant amount of effort put in by Gosling to perfect the piano shots, which were impressively all performed by him.


It’s a film so visually stunning it’s hard to take your eyes away from it. There is, however, never a risk that it was simply a platform to reference more familiar films of old. In a breathtaking final segment, we take a walk through memory lane with nods to a number of classic musicals, but they are simply nods in what amounts to one of the most perfectly-balanced final sequences I’ve seen in cinema. Gasps were audible around the auditorium.

The soundtrack is destined to stick around for years to come. Gosling/Stone duets “City of Stars” and “A Lovely Night” are both standouts, but it will be “Audition (The Fools Who Dream)” that will be vying for an Oscar early next year. A beautiful number written by Justin Harwitz, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, it is left to Emma Stone to deliver an emotionally raw live performance.

The only downside for me is that I have to wait for another two months to see it again. A must see.

by hutchwp

Film review – 偽りの隣人 / Creepy (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 2016)

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s latest release Creepy received its U.K. premiere tonight as part of the London Film Festival. It blends elements of police drama, suspense and mild horror to create an intriguing film that achieves much but ultimately falls down due to a lack of ruthlessness in editing that would have helped the pacing.

Set in approximately 2009, it tells the story of a retired policeman Takakura (Hidetoshi Nishijima) who has changed careers to work as a criminology professor at a local university. Having moved to a new part of town with his wife Yasuko (Yūko Takeuchi) and dog Max, they begin to become suspicious of the titular creepy neighbour Nishino (Teruyuki Kagawa) and his daughter Mio (Ryoko Fujino), whilst Takakura attempts to solve an old case that has come out of the woodwork.

Creepy Nishino

The casting of the genuinely creepy Kagawa is a solid choice. Director Kurosawa is on familiar ground, having worked with him on 2009’s Tokyo Sonata, though this role is very much a departure from the jobless family man we saw previously. When the results are this good there’s no need to change.

Kurosawa, working again with cinematographer Akiko Ashizawa, achieves a lot with natural lighting to create darkness for the lead characters as they delve into their inner-most thoughts. This was an effective technique used previously by the pair in Journey To The Shore and is mined more subtly here to arguably better effect, especially in one particular witness interrogation scene.

However, there are flaws. The ending could genuinely have happened about twenty minutes prior to when it finally occurs, and when the story is finally resolved the relief I felt wasn’t for any of the particular characters but more for the fact it signalled the end was in sight. It’s unfortunate that the ending is so shocking and powerful with some great acting that was undermined by the preceding needless plot extension.

There were a few ideas throughout the film that seemed to fizzle out. Saki (Haruna Kawaguchi) was really prominent for a good portion of the film but was clumsily written out before the resolution of her storyline; her family went missing but she doesn’t seem to care why in the end. A police chief is written into the key part of the story to get Takakura out of a dead end in the plot. There’s a mind control element to the story that isn’t ever fully explained, instead expecting the viewer to just go with it. 

After a long setup, this film is genuinely exhilarating for about an hour. With a shorter ending and a little more clarity, it could have been much better than the final result. For me, it is a missed opportunity.

by hutchwp

Film review – Hunt for the Wilderpeople (Taika Waititi, 2016)

SPOILER ALERT – There’s a spoiler pretty much immediately in the first paragraph of this review. Sorry, it just turned out that way. Come back when you’ve seen the film and rejoice in its excellence with me. General  and spoile-free review: it’s excellent and well worth watching.

Here we go…

…

There is a moment, about twenty minutes into Hunt for the Wilderpeople, where the laughs start rolling in and the set up falls into place, proving that very good things come to those who wait. That this happens in the middle of the funeral of one of the lead characters, who is unexpectedly killed-off in the middle of the opening act, proves the point that comedy doesn’t have to be routine to be absolutely hilarious.

Indeed, looking at the two lead actors, there is nothing to suspect they would work on a comedy duo level. Sam Neill has been doing fantastic work for years, delivering memorably serious performances in the likes of The Hunt for Red October, Dead Calm, The Piano and Jurassic Park. His partner in crime in Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Julian Dennison, is pretty much a newcomer to the industry, having starred in 2015’s Paper Planes and not much else (at least not much that has troubled the international market).

It’s strange then that they have formed a bizarre chemistry around which this film’s many successes hang, taking turns to be the straight man when the time is right. It’s a successful combination and one that takes what could have been a simple live-action remake of Pixar’s Up and turns it into an enjoyable romp through the New Zealand countryside.

Dennison is, ultimately, the real find of the film. As the rebellious youth that nobody wants, he is privy to some of the best lines in the film. His delivery is natural and faultless.

Taika Waititi may be in the process of directing the upcoming next instalment of the Thor film series (set for release in late 2017), but he is staying rooted to what he knows best for as long as possible. One can only hope that Marvel allow him to finish his journey with the film rather than lose faith at the eleventh hour as they did with the last quirky comedy director they went with: Edgar Wright.

On this evidence, they would be wise to not make the same mistake twice.

Hunt for the WIlderpeople is available now on DVD.