Ah, a 'late-morning' screening. While the attending crowd was slightly more varied than the ones for Under The Skin and Knock Knock, there was still a strong contingent of Unaccompanied Middle Aged Man™ present. And during the lengthy, slow-motion opening sequence of Nocturnal Animals, I could sense many brows furrowing around the room and mouths falling agape, silently forming the look of "hang on, this is not the film that the trailer sold me…". There is a context for what happens at the beginning, but only in that the context is itself out of context. I won't spoil it, you'll see for yourself when you watch the film.
Confused? Welcome to Nocturnal Animals.
Tom Ford's adaptation of Austin Wright's novel, Tony and Susan, follows Amy Adams (Susan no less), as a fundamentally unhappy contemporary artist who receives a pre-publication manuscript from her ex-husband, Edward, after several years of non-contact. When it turns out that Edward's book is a violently clear allegory for his feelings about their failed marriage, Susan is appalled and enthralled in equal measure. The film splits into a visual adaptation of the work, Susan's reactions to it and a series of progressive flashbacks which reveal the ways their relationship broke down.
Nowhere near as challenging as it'd like to think it is, Nocturnal Animals is, nonetheless, very good at being difficult to like. Probably a little too good, actually. It's well acted and solidly directed, but I couldn't work out if the film has a terrible, clunky script, or a brilliant script of terrible, clunky characters. Maybe they're the same thing, even though they shouldn't be.
With Adams' as the emotionally reinforced artist, Armie Hammer as her second (and externally lecherous) husband, Jake Gyllenhaal as her flawed husband in the flashbacks and the flawed central character in Susan's interpretation of the book, and obstructive or negative supporting characters in all three timelines, I don't think it's unfair to say that there's not a single redeeming character in the whole film. That's not to say if has no redeeming features, but they're scattered loosely down a long, dark road.
The novel Susan receives depicts a man (Tony, from the title or the original book, above) driving through the southern states of America with his wife and daughter when they become ambushed by a gang of rednecks. One thing leads to another and the man is separated from his family while they're raped and murdered. The rest of the story follows Tony as he teams up with a borderline corrupt cop to bring the gang to violent justice. It's basically a 1970s exploitation flick with a framing device.
The bottom line is, for all the stark visuals, subtext and narrative layering, Nocturnal Animals slowly descends to a sort of art-student torture-porn, raising one eyebrow as it plays ironically in a sandpit it thinks it's too good for, all the while throwing in flashbacks and real-world segments which make decreasing amounts of sense*1. True to its title, the film embraces that sense of heightened-yet-detached unreality which is both the confidant and tormentor of the 3am insomniac. But that's no consolation.
With plenty of frowning and yelling but little genuine emotion on display, Tom Ford's film is a compelling artifice of drama. Which might actually be the point, admittedly…
It'll be more atmospheric on a big screen than a small one, yes.
Oh, I have no idea.
No.
No, but I will ask you to explain yourself in great detail.
There isn't.
Level 2: Nocturnal Animals features Isla Fisher, who starred in 2010's Burke and Hare alongside Simon 'Plutt' Pegg, Andy 'Snoke' Serkis, Tim 'Palpatine' Curry and Christopher 'Dooku' Lee...
*1 Okay, this section is in highlight-to-read spoilers for people who've seen the film and hopefully understood it more than I have:
1) The scene with Susan's colleague and the mobile phone which shows a monitor-video of a baby in a crib before a screaming demon leaps into frame, causing Susan to scream herself and drop the phone: I was under the impression that it was one of those prank videos that occasionally does the rounds. Except that her colleague's reaction displays no recognition at all, never mind amusement, once the punchline has been delivered. Okay, her phone screen is now smashed, but you'd at least get a "well, that joke backfired" line in response. So the other alternative is that the video is a nightvision baby-monitor app, as described, and Susan is in such a bad place psychologically that she's hallucinated the demon's appearance causing her to drop the phone. Except that we get no further hallucinations of this nature to suggest a descent into madness. So what gives with that scene?
Oh, and 2, who's the late-teen girl that Susan phones on the Sunday morning, who calls her 'mom'? The story leads us to assume that she doesn't have any children, indeed the 'bad thing' Susan did was aborting Edward's child (the vengeful reason for the couple's daughter's death in the book) at the start of her relationship with Hutton. But in one scene, Susan tells her assistant that her ex-husband is from 'a couple of years ago', which would be nowhere near enough time for Susan and Hutton to have a daughter of this age (and would also explain why neither Adams or Gyllenhaal look that much younger in the flashbacks - certainly not twenty years younger). And apart from anything else, Hutton's presented as such a prize tool that there's no way their relationship could have limped along for eighteen years, child or otherwise. Was Susan impacted so much by the discovery of the bodies in the book that she hallucinated her own aborted daughter back to life? I only ask because the poor girl isn't mentioned before or after that. Bizarre.
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.
Making headlines for all the right and wrong reasons (although there's little bad publicity in the lead-up to a film) is Ken Loach's brutally frank critique of the current benefits system in Britain. After suffering a major heart attack, Newcastle carpenter Daniel (Dave Johns) is assessed as being fit for work by a governmental sub-contract team, despite being forcibly signed off by his doctor. Unable to legally work and unable to claim either Jobseeker's Allowance (because he's not fit enough to accept work) or Employment and Support Allowance (because he's been declared fit enough to work), Daniel finds himself in a downward spiral of bureaucracy and departmental neglect. Against this, he befriends Katie (Hayley Squires), a young mother of two who's been moved up from London by the Housing Department and is also struggling to get a foot on the employment ladder. While they rely on each other for platonic emotional support, that only goes so far as the desperation of poverty tightens around them*1…
Loach's knack for making unrelentingly grim subject matter intrinsically watchable has never been more timely. He underlines the broken nature of the current system without resorting to hysterics; not calling for it to be scrapped or replaced, just fixed. In other hands, the more surly or unhelpful members of the Job Centre staff would be exaggerated or demonised, but here they're presented as other pieces in the same game, trapped by the rules which prevent anyone from moving forward. They're not necessarily sympathetic characters, but the flaws are revealed in the system, not the people.
The film is never an easy watch, indeed that's the point. Paul Laverty's screenplay captures the frustration and anger of the situation, but struggles with the feeling. While the audience genuinely feels for the film's characters, dialogue in the more emotional scenes seems to swing between heavy-handedly scripted and clunkingly improvised. Many of the incidental characters feel like they're reading a script (even if, in the case of the DWP assessment staff, they're literally reading a script), tripping over their lines, laden with false emphasis. And for reasons I can't quite work out, Dave Johns seems unable to hold the Newcastle accent. When it slips, it goes through that sort of posh-Geordie that Kevin Whately's does in ITV's Lewis and ends up somewhere in Middlesex. All the more bizarre since Johns is originally from Wallsend so should have no problem staying on target. All of this never derails things, but you know what I'm like for accents, and Newcastle's my part of the world originally. I'll put it down to a director who was maybe more focused on the message than its delivery, anyway.
The film was every bit as intense and revelatory as I'd anticipated, but not as emotionally engaging. And if the last eighteen months in the UK has proved anything, it's that winning people's minds over isn't enough: you've got to win their hearts. But the rest of tonight's audience bought into it, so what do I know?
But credit where it's undeniably due, Loach has shot a film entirely in Newcastle and there's not a single glory-shot of The Bridge. Which is more than I can manage once I step off the train…
In recent memory? A Street Cat Named Bob, probably.
But maybe if you'd got to the end of that film and thought 'well, I could have done without the spiritually uplifting triumph over adversity, to be honest'.
Although the film's message should be broadcast as widely as possible, I, Daniel Blake is inherently televisual.
It does.
To be fair, I don't think it is.
Not at all.
Not at all.
Level 2: This film stars Hayley Squires, who also appeared in 2013's Complicit, as did David 'Kallus' Oyelowo.
*1 Okay, spoilery ponder for those who've seen the film (highlight-to-read): You know that bit where Dan works out that Katie's been working as a prostitute so goes to the brothel to confront her? Well a) how did he know she'd be the sex worker he got when he arrived? There's got to be more than one of them there or that's just a terrible business model, and b) there was no address on the scrap of paper or envelope he found, just a phone number and a web address, so does that mean he's been using the computer at the job centre to look up escorts online? No wonder they've stopped his fucking benefits…
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.
Next up, in the category of Films Which Are Marketed Like Kids Films But Which Aren't Really Kids Films Even Though There's Relatively Little Content In The Film To Make It Unsuitable For Kids, is Roger Spottiswoode's A Street Cat Named Bob, adapted from James Bowen's autobiographical book of the same name. It covers James' time as a recovering heroin addict in London, living in a squalid flat where he befriends a remarkable stray cat who inspires him to persevere in turning his life around.
The most awkward aspect of the screen adaptation is that it's nowhere near as dark, bleak or frustrating as you know some of the actual events were at the time. But how could it be, if the film is still going to be an uplifting story of redemption? Scenes where James deals with the authorities as a man who's trying not to slip between the cracks of the system evoke I, Daniel Blake a little. Similarly, a sequence in which he locks himself in his flat to wrench himself off the last dregs of a Methadone program feels like a tidier (and more successful, to be fair) version of the opening minutes of Trainspotting. There are even echoes of Inside Llewyn Davis as the cat quickly becomes a narrative metaphor some something much larger. It's not that the film necessarily sanitises these events, but gives the impression that they're being skipped over a little because of time constraints, which can make them feel more heavy-handed.
Luke Treadaway is marvellous in the pivotal role, supported ably by Joanne Froggatt as his support-worker, Ruta Gedmintas as his neighbour and cat-whisperer, Anthony Head as the estranged and aggrieved father, and of course Bob the cat*1. Although while I'm sure it's biographically accurate, Treadaway's quasi-Australian accent in the film tended to grate as it drifted in some scenes and completely out of others. Worse still, there are some dialogue exchanges with his neighbour where she began to speak with an Aussie-twang while he wasn't at all. Bizarre. By no means a deal-breaker, but you know what I'm like when it comes to accents…
When the story is focusing on anything other than the relationship between James and Bob, it's a bit melodramatic, simplistic and twee. But A Street Cat Named Bob is also everything it needs to be. And as I saw the film on Wednesday 9th November, it even managed to take my mind off the news-events of the day, which really is something*2…
Question for those of you who've seen the film: The BBFC-card at the beginning flashed up for a couple of seconds as National Theatre Live's production of A Streetcar Named Desire (cropped in the wrong aspect-ratio) before jump-cutting to the correct card (and presented correctly). As the BBFC information isn't projected from a different reel/file, this appears to be part of the actual final print itself. Does anyone know why/how this has come about?
Difficult to say as it feels more televisual than cinematic, and I don't watch a lot of telly.
I don't mean that as a criticism, it just has a "TV-cast".
Only if you're desperate to see the film sooner rather than later; this has got Sunday DVD written all over it ;).
It does.
Probably not, to be fair.
Nope.
There isn't.
Although there was one in an advert for tea which ran before it.
Level 2: The film stars Luke Treadaway, who also appeared in Attack The Block alongside John 'FN-2187' Boyega.
If you're having trouble telling the Treadaway Twins apart, by the way, Luke is the one who appears here as a homeless addict trying to rebuild his life and starred here as a kid with Aspergers struggling to cope with the confusing world around him.
His brother Harry does things like Cockneys vs Zombies and The Lone Ranger...
*1 There's also a cameo-appearance by James Bowen himself which rivals the face-palming obviousness of The Proclaimers' previous walk-on and would be unforgivable, were it not for the amount of props the guy deserves for still being alive in the first place.
But seriously though, James. Seriously…
*2 Although my already anxious mood didn't make the film an easy watch, to the point where I began to suspect ill-motives of characters that weren't headed down that path. Maybe I'm even too cynical and paranoid for feel-good movies at the moment ;)
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.
Arrival (SPOILER FREE)
Cert: 12A / 116 mins / Dir. Denis Villeneuve / Trailer
I shall have to tread lightly here, since the real power of Arrival lies in a spoiler-free first viewing. That said, I know I'm going to enjoy the hell out of watching it again at least once, too.
When twelve gigantic alien Shells suddenly and silently arrive at unrelated positions around the globe, the authorities scramble to ascertain who is inside them, why they're here and what they'll do to achieve that why. The US military calls upon the services of highly experienced translator Louise (Amy Adams) to decode noises they've recorded, but her learning curve of communication with the visitors*1 is hampered by the un-cooperation of international governments, their sense of paranoia and increasingly itchy trigger-fingers…
All that's just one part of the film, of course, and not even the largest one. Running parallel to the muted Independence Day plot is a story of loss, grief and resolution, but always with an eye on the hypernatural. Make no mistake, the core of Arrival is distinctly heavyweight, yet only as much as the audience will want it to be. At times it's deliciously cynical; while the film tends to focus on the US-based response team itself, glimpses of news footage illustrate my own long-held belief that in the event of a grandiose extra-terrestrial arrival, general society would, to put it delicately, go completely to shit. So it's hardly a barrel of laughs for the times we're living in. Additionally, the Hard Sci-Fi™ part of the movie (ie, the nuts and bolts plot rather than what the film is actually about) can feel heavy-handed every time someone in a military uniform scowls and talks about nuking the Shells. That side of the story is one of the few things that its showier (albeit emptier) relative actually did quite well, although if I need reassurance that humanity are dicks, I can switch on the news, thanks.
But Arrival holds the attention. Much like the gradual communication breakthrough between Louise and the Heptapod visitors, the film takes a while to go from being interesting to being intriguing. The story never drags its heels, but the setups it carefully assembles during the first act are deliberately disingenuous. The payoff is worth it though, a section of the film I watched whilst grinning like an idiot.
If you couldn't tell by the trailer, this is really Amy Adams' movie, though and through. The supporting cast are reliable enough, but Forest Whitaker and Jeremy Renner appear to have been cast purely to give the poster of a philosophical sci-fi movie a bit more mainstream pull. Neither really have roles justifiable of the casting or with enough for them to actually do. Tonally it has more in common with director Villeneuve's Prisoners than most alien-invasion flicks, but the emotionally profound element seems to be fighting with an intriguing sci-fi plot device (which also seems to be fighting with the aforementioned impatient-man-in-camouflage-is-impatient). While the central elements of the screenplay are explained, I'd have liked to see them more thoroughly explored. But that's a discussion for next time.
Short version: The film stayed with me, I really enjoyed it.
I think the film's ending will be the real Rorschach test for audiences, though.
Not because the events are open to interpretation but, ironically, precisely the opposite.
Go and watch Arrival before somebody spoils it for you.
Jurassic Park, Prisoners, The Others.
No, really.
For the atmosphere and immersion, yes.
It does. Although probably not everything I wanted from it (hardly the fault of the film).
*1Heptopods, as the seven-legged, faceless creatures are dubbed in the film. While our view of the aliens is often limited, they reminded me a lot of a hyper-intelligent spider-phase of Dagobah's Gnarltrees.
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.
