The Railway Man (SPOILERS)
Cert: 15 / 116 mins / Dir. Jonathan Teplitzky
It gives me no great pleasure to say that I wasn't really moved either way by The Railway Man. What should have been a thoroughly thought-provoking, if not harrowing, study of pride, post-traumatic stress disorder and forgiveness came over as a rather clunky melodrama (albeit with remarkably solid acting, somehow).
Despite the excellent, tense atmosphere the film creates, I wasn't really moved by the scenes of emotional breakdown in the first act, wasn't really horrified by those of torture in the second, and wasn't convinced by the reconciliation in the third; all of which is only exacerbated by the fact that this actually happened. The film doesn't get all War Horse about the moral issues at play, but it makes little attempt to paint grey areas either. I was expecting the story to convey the horrors of war, but instead only learned that Eric Lomax had a really shitty time of things after 1942 (which I knew before I went in, so…).
Maybe the film, being released strategically for awards-season, has just been paled by its competition in 2014? Or maybe choice lines of emphasised dialogue like "I am happy" and "I am sorry" sound like they should have been left at the first draft?
…then again, the audience around me seemed fairly engrossed, so maybe the problem with this film lies with this viewer.
Pretty much, yeah.
I didn't. You might.
Not for me, but hopefully for the folks who made it, yes.
The cinematography's nice, but you don't need to see it on a massive screen.
I won't.
Doubtful.
There ain't.
1) In 'the funeral scene', why do the surviving comrades all have Scottish accents? They didn't when they were prisoners.
2) Looking at the standard-issue 'comparison' photos over the final credits, Jeremy Irvine looks like the young Eric Lomax, and Colin Firth looks like the old Eric Lomax. And Eric Lomax looks like Eric Lomax. So why doesn't Jeremy Irvine look like Colin Firth*1?
*1 Even though Jeremy Irvine does a bloody good job of acting and sounding like Colin Firth, and underlining the fact that Colin Firth is really just acting and sounding like Colin Firth. #ColinFirth
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
Is January the 7th too early to call Film Of The Year? It seems hasty, I know, but Steve McQueen's presentation of the tale of Solomon Northup is a fucking masterpiece. McQueen allows the tale to unravel at its own pace, and never resorts to emotional button-pushing or hyperbole, letting the story paint its own picture long after you've finished watching. Cinematographer Sean Bobbitt's camera often lingers long past the point of being comfortable, but never exploitatively, and never without reason. There are few artists who could find beauty in the New Orleans landscape in the midst of a story of hateful oppression, but Bobbitt manages to find and integrate it perfectly. The production design is equally fantastic, and has an effortless authenticity, especially in the farmland segments.
The film's sound-design and score work hand-in-hand, particularly in the first act, and Hans Zimmer's work is understated to perfection, avoiding the trap of many a movie where the soundtrack tells you what to think and how to feel. While there's never any doubt over what's Good and Bad in 12 Years, the film respects its audience enough paint some grey areas to keep them engaged.
For the most part, the supporting performances in the film are outstanding (particularly given how little screentime some of the A-listers are given). From time to time the dialogue feels a little stiff, with the formal language of the mid 1800's not quite flowing as smoothly as you think it perhaps should, but it's barely noticeable in the grand scheme of things. Oh, and huge props to the makeup/effects department, too. Ouch.
But the lion's share of the praise really has to go to Chiwetel Ejiofor for his portrayal of Solomon. Disbelieving, angry, resigned, determined and never losing faith, there's a very restrained commitment about his performance which is cinematic magnetism. Even the final scene is underplayed in a way like no other film I've seen. Ejiofor's isn't a performance which screams 'give me the Oscar', yet it's entirely deserving (as is the entire production) of the many awards it will receive.
Go and watch this film.
Fairly, but the film's less spoon-feeding than the trailer would suggest.
I did.
Undoubtedly.
It'll be powerful wherever you watch it, but the sooner the better, so cinema.
I will, a bit.
Yes, but not right away; while I wasn't emotionally drained as such, it's not the kind of ride you want to get straight back on.
There isn't.
Did you notice the one brief scene where Fassbender let his accent slip? I did. Then again, I was looking for it. It's Fassbender, after all. Fair play to the guy, he did bloody well in this.
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
Even at a glute-testing two and a half hours, there's a feeling that Long Walk To Freedom needs the sort of screentime which only a TV series can bestow. In some ways the film is far too long, yet in others not nearly long enough. The first act positively whizzes by, and many of the formative events of the young Mandela's years seem to be shown if only to tick them off some checklist. It's this part of the film which does justice to neither the man nor the cause he fought for. Once events leading up to Mandela's imprisonment are played out, the screenplay settles down to a more coherent pace, and we begin to get a clearer picture of Mandela's ideals and modus operandi, although again, if you're going to show 27 years in one act of a film, you have to skim over a fair amount. The plot picks up pace again once the South African government begin negotiations leading to Mandela's release, and the subsequent years seem more a set of bullet points than a character study.
As a personal portrayal of Nelson Mandela, Long Walk To Freedom struggles despite the fantastic work of both Idris Elba and Naomie Harris; there are too many political events at play for the film to concentrate fully on the complicated relationship between the two. As an historical document, the film also falls short, trying to relay too large a timespan in one sitting, skipping over too many details for viewers who aren't already familiar with the chronology.
On a more technical note, the passage of time is relayed quite shoddily for a movie which is about just that. Quite often we get location captions, but relatively few of these feature the year in which the segment is taking place. Since many of the scenes are years apart, the audience is left guessing the elapsed time by gauging how much Nelson's children have grown, especially since Idris Elba doesn't seem to age at all for the first two acts, and Naomie Harris either has shares in Oil of Olay, or is some sort of vampire. My make-up-department flippancy aside, in a film based on chronological history, not dating most of the scenes seems a bewildering choice, at best.
By the end of the film I felt as if I'd been taught (albeit fleetingly) about a series of historical events, but not necessarily about the people who took part in them. Anyone watching the film hoping to get a glimpse of the man behind the legend could well come away feeling disappointed, and I'd expected to be far more moved by the final reel than I actually was. That said, it's worth a watch to see what Elba and Harris bring to their roles; they're always good value, and Long Walk To Freedom is no exception.
Largely.
Not enough.
I think it achieves what Justin Chadwick set out to do.
You won't lose anything by watching this at home.
No.
With the best will in the world, I shouldn't imagine so.
There isn't. There's room for one, but even I can see how inappropriate it would seem…
I think a film about one of the most influential and important people in the 20th century should be more… well, inspirational, frankly. Let me know what you thought of Long Walk To Freedom in that comment-box down there, or via the Facebook page.
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
So, Batman, Lois Lane, Hawkeye, Mystique and Rocket Racoon all walk into a mobster's attorney's office… stop me if you've heard it, yeah? David O.Russell's latest movie packs a solid cast into two and a half hours of lying, scheming, conniving and more side-boob than the M*il Online's sidebar puts out in an entire hour*1. The players have been hired to bring their A-Game, and bring it they do, but the film never quite reaches the heights you feel it's capable of. The soundtrack and wardrobe should be pointing toward a feelgood groove of Anchorman levels, especially in the first act where we're meeting the characters at the top of their game, but director Russell doesn't let us forget for a second that there's trouble ahead. Unfortunately when that trouble arrives, we don't really care enough for any of the shifty chancers to feel its full impact.
There are some truly fantastic moments in American Hustle, bringing greed, trust, anger and humour into the mix, but they don't really gel together to make a great story; it's more a collection of great scenes. Not knowing how much of the depicted action is 'true'*2, the plot seems to be a scattergun affair, always entertaining but needlessly complex (or if not complex then over-detailed and under-explained). The problem (for me) is that it's sort of like a mashup between The Godfather and an episode of Hustle, both of which I love, but both of which are structured more… well, coherently. In keeping with the format of the BBC con-man series, there's a reveal sequence at the climax of the film, but it feels rushed and nowhere near as satisfying as it should (for reasons which are too spoilery to go into in this review). Russell does a lovely job of making the audience feel as uneasy as the characters, the more they get out of their depth, but they payoff seems nowhere near as outlandish as the events which brought everyone there. I suspect this is where the 'true-story' aspect has its limitations, and that there's a far more exciting movie to be made with the same cast.
But fair play to casting director Mary Vernieu for finally putting Robert De Niro back onscreen as a genuinely threatening presence; it's a relief to see that he has still got it. Enough of this grumpy-old-man rom-com shit, already.
Not quite everything it could (or should) be, American Hustle is worth the price of admission just to see a great cast give some fine performances. There's just the nagging feeling that it's all for nought; too exaggerated to be real, not enough fun to be fiction.
The film's not as slick as the trailer.
Mostly.
For me, not quite.
As fun as the film is, you may get more out of it watching at home.
No.
I will.
There isn't.
Amy Adams' Brit-voice is meant to be all over the shop, right? Like it's an audible metaphor for the con, or something? Because if not, it just seems like she couldn't hold an accent if she had two 15" catcher's mitts, coated in superglue…
*1 Sarcasm aside, it's a little worrying that cinematographer Linus Sandgren spends so much time looking at Amy Adams' boobs, whereas the rest of us would get a restraining order.
*2 A title card at the beginning of the film tells us "Some of these events actually happened", and while that's fine, I'm getting a bit hacked off with the amount of true-story cinema lately. If I want true, I'll watch the news, thanks. And yes, I'm very aware that this trend isn't over yet. The next two movies I'll be watching are fact-based, albeit each with a sufficiently noteworthy basis. Wow. How's that for reverse film-snobbery? Look, just give me some fucking superheroes, alright?
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
