Review: Beau Is Afraid

Beau Is Afraid
Cert: 15 / 178 mins / Dir. Ari Aster / Trailer

Well. It's usually a sign of a good night when you get in from the cinema*¹ and your partner asks how the film was and you realise you can describe in intricate chronological detail what happened, but you have almost no idea what the film was about.

Beau is Afraid then, is production company A24 having an absolute normal one...

BEAU

Ari Aster returns to bring us Beau Wasserman (Joaquin Phoenix), a middle-aged and deeply-troubled man trying to catch a domestic flight to visit his cold yet over-protective mother on the anniversary of his father's death, when his entire life suddenly falls apart in the most extraordinary sequence of events. What unfolds is a hallucinogenic psychodrama - part therapy-session, part panic attack - filled with guilt, grief, discovery and recrimination. Like Philip Larkin, transmogrified into hard celluloid. It's always engaging and never knowingly straightforward.

Phoenix gives a masterfully emotive performance of course, although to be fair we'd expect little else at this point in his career. So much of the film is just extended reaction-shots of the lead actor that it's actually quite amazing in itself. The central storyline is a meth-enhanced cheese dream of Clockwise, a persistently dark and escalated farce which constantly blurs the lines between fantasy and tragedy. Although at a certain point you can stop trying to connect the points of symbolism and just relax into how absurd the whole thing has quickly become.

MADISON COUNTY

That said, this is being variously billed as Horror (among other genres) when it's really not. Aster's previous outings Hereditary and Midsommar had a far more linear narrative to rein in their very focused shocks, whereas this makes Darren Aronofsky's mother! look like an insurance documentary. As well as a flamboyant number of plot-feints, every scene in the movie veers between slightly-too-long and excruciating (which means the entire film is either far-too-long or perfectly elongated, depending on how you're approaching it). It's a calculated exercise in testing the commitment and patience of the viewer*², and the film snob in me respects the fuck out of that. I have to respect it because in terms of emotional storytelling it's a masterpiece; it's just a masterpiece that I did not particularly enjoy the experience of sitting through.

Full marks then for how uncompromisingly demanding this film is of its audience, yet still managing to secure a mainstream cinema release. Ari Aster glibly reaches so far that he will leave many people cold, and if anything I love it more for that.

Beau Is Afraid is 100% what it's supposed to be, and yet so much so that I cannot honestly recommend this to anybody...

*¹ It should be noted that in 2023, advance-screenings of subtitled Korean and Arabic dramas attracted very healthy audience numbers in this provincial multiplex, whereas only nine people wanted to see what lunacy Ari Aster was offering this time. One has to assume that's down to previous experience when even Russell Crowe's Italian accent can somehow get bums on seats... ^{[ BACK ]}

*² Credit where it's due though, not one of the nine people walked out throughout the film's almost-three hours. And bonus marks for you if you watch right this to the very end (like six of us did). ^{[ BACK ]}

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.

Review: Beautiful Boy

Beautiful Boy
Cert: 15 / 120 mins / Dir. Felix Van Groeningen / Trailer



And now to the golden, rolling hills of Marin County California, home to Skywalker Ranch and the beating heart of all that is Star Wars. But we're not here for deathsticks, we're here for a tale of weed, pills, crystal meth and good ol' fashioned heroin. So closer to Ewan McGregor's turn in Trainspotting than Attack Of The Clones, then. Which might explain why my brain kept starting Lust For Life at inappropriate moments throughout Beautiful Boy…

Based on the twin-memoirs of the real-life protagonists, the story follows David Sheff (Steve Carell) as he tries to reconcile his teenage son Nic's (Timothée Chalamet) escalating addiction to a range of narcotics with holding together the rest of his family (Maura Tierney as David's partner Karen, and their two young children played by Oakley Bull and Christian Convery), and maintaining a civil relationship with his ex-wife and Nic's mum, Vicki (Amy Ryan). Earnest hand-wringing all round.

BOY

My observation at the top wasn't just glib sarcasm, Beautiful Boy really is Trainspotting for the middle-aged, middle-class fan of generational angst, there are glimpses of bleakness at regular intervals, but on the whole it's a reassuringly safe journey, told from a father's perspective. That said, enjoyment of this film will depend largely on what baggage the viewer has brought in with them.

In an early conversation, Carrell's David has a conversation with his son who is just starting to seriously experiment with drugs. Nic tries to articulate his frustration but only manages something about 'blocking out stupid reality'. When the father asks in a state of genuine puzzlement "…what's stupid about reality?", everyone in the auditorium suddenly realises which side of the fence they're watching the movie from.

GOLDEN

Delicately handled by director Groeningen, the end product isn't quite as syrupy as you might expect but tells most of its story from David's perspective and so avoids a lot of the grit. It often feels like Beautiful Boy is afraid to get its hands dirty, for the fear of not being able to clean them again in time for the closing credits.

Outstanding work from Timothée Chalamet throughout holds the whole thing together. Carrell, Tierney and Ryan are strong too, but this isn't their film. They're a supporting-cast in every sense, and are playing in far broader ways. Also worth noting is the solid casting of Kue Lawrence and Jack Dylan Grazer as younger versions of Nic in the intermittent flashbacks. Their performances aren't showy or overly foreshadowing, but they sell the evolution of the protagonist effortlessly (in all fairness, the only character in the film who actually appears to age).

Beautiful Boy isn't a perfect ride, and our director clearly has an eye on his awards-cabinet when that's unlikely to come to fruition, but it's made with sincerity. Perhaps ironically, that's both the film's biggest problem and its saving grace…

Beautiful Boy plays like a bittersweet sequel to The Way, Way Back, covering the next darker chapter where everything wasn't alright after all.
But the unfocused anger at the centre of it all is the same.



Only if you already know you're going to get the right things out of it. Which sort of defeats the object of watching a new film, admittedly.

Although it's perhaps worth noting that as evangelical as I am about my Unlimited card, I didn't get to catch the pre-Christmas advance screening of this and now it's not playing at my local. As a result, I did pay to watch this (albeit the £4.99 that Vue are charging in their region cinemas these days) and I rather enjoyed it. Make of that what you will.



It is.



Difficult to say, but everyone should be fairly proud of what they've made.



It's entirely possible.



There isn't.



Level 2: Timothée Chalamet was in Interstellar, alongside David 'Agent Kallus' Oyelowo, and John 'Yoda In The TESB Radio Drama' Lithgow.







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.

Review: Central Intelligence

Central Intelligence
Cert: 12A / 108 mins / Dir. Rawson Marshall Thurber / Trailer



I don't want to start this review on a downer (not least because I usually work up to that), but there was a pretty good crowd for the opening-night performance of Central Intelligence. In fact, there were approximately three-times more people in the room than are currently booked for the opening night of Ghostbusters in less than two weeks time. Just throwing that out there. There'll be plenty of time to judge that movie in due course. And plenty of room too, I shouldn't wonder.

Anyway. When 38yr old forensic-accountant CJ (Kevin Hart) gets an unexpected friend-request from painfully-shy former schoolmate Bob (Dwayne Johnson), his life is quickly turned upside down as he's dragged into a world of encrypted data, government agents and getting shot at! Danger and hilarity ensue as this odd couple have to... yeah, you get the picture. It's that film. It's all in the trailer.

The film doesn't start particularly strongly, with a 1996 high-school sequence featuring CGI'd versions of Kevin Hart and Dwayne Johnson that are so far down the uncanny valley, they're practically in another film. But with a couple of pratfalls and some heavy-handed sentiment, we're whizzed through a Mission-Impossible-Lite title sequence, and things drop into a more familiar gear.

The plot, as intimated above, involves Hart being a former school-champion turned office-drone, and Johnson being a former fat-kid turned CIA killing machine. A seemingly chance encounter leads to a conspiracy-plot mixed with ferocious slapstick and patchy ad-libbing from Hart. A mis-matched buddy movie with more of its fair share of spy-shenanigans shoehorned in to keep the set-pieces moving along. It is, as also intimated above, a movie you've seen several times before. Perhaps the only saving grace of the film is Dwayne Johnson's performance. He's actually a far better comic straight-man than many give him credit for (his comedy-game is certainly stronger than the action-autopiloting he pays his mortgage with), and he offsets Kevin Hart's incessant shrieking perfectly. And Hart isn't terrible in this, but he's really being paid just to turn up and play Kevin Hart™. And together they just about make the whole thing work (tonight's audience certainly enjoyed it, which is good). Director Rawson Marshall Thurber delivers the action and comedy efficiently enough, but struggles to find the balance between the two.

And while the film doesn't dawdle in its storytelling, it definitely ends about fifteen minutes later than it should, in a self-congratulatory afterglow which is dragged out for far longer than any of the action-sequences, and then leads in to a credits-roll accompanied by some incredibly laboured out-takes. If learning to love yourself is the key to happiness, this could be the most smug movie you'll watch this year.

Although it's probably better than the trailers would suggest, this isn't a great film by any means; but I have seen far far worse (and with this movie's lead performers, too). Central Intelligence is to cinematic comedy what Independence Day Resurgence is to sci-fi: formulaic, largely inoffensive (if thoroughly insincere) mainstream filler.

Well, in another life this movie would have Mark Wahlberg or Will Ferrell in it.
That sort of thing.



Not particularly.



Probably, but it's aiming low.



As passable as this is, no.



Probably not.



Definitely not.



Level 2: That Dwayne Johnson was in 2008's Get Smart, as was Terence 'Valorum' Stamp.





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.

Review: Goosebumps

Goosebumps (3D)
Cert: PG / 103 mins / Dir. Rob Letterman / Trailer



Why has this movie taken so long to come out in the UK? It debuted in October in the US, and it's now out on DVD while the UK still hasn't had the full opening yet. It's that sort of lacklustre marketing and staggered release which makes it appear that the studio is noncommittal about what they've created, which is a real shame because Goosebumps is quite marvellous in its own way. Damn, that sounds noncommittal. Right, let me try again...

This big-screen adaptation of what can only be described as a literary phenomenon sometimes feels a little overshadowed by the presence of Jack Black and saunters in on the heels of some rather unimpressive trailers. Black over-eggs the pudding of course, but that's why you hire Jack Black. In a comedy/adventure environment, he's value for money if nothing else.

The film takes a good twenty minutes of its run-time to get warmed up (or rather, to become more than the sum of its parts), and the early backstory/exposition can feel a little heavy-handed, even making allowances for the target demographic. But after the initial scene-setting, the script is far more comfortable in itself as Goosebumps becomes a family-friendly horror adventure, with slapstick and dry humour in equal measure.

The books which inspired the film may be a product of the 1990s, but the movie itself is an almost Spielbergian homage to adolescent adventure movies of the 80s, like a feel-good version of The Lost Boys. For obvious reasons, it's packed to the rafters with Goosebumps references and in-jokes, but there are also Easter-eggs and nods to all manner of horror flicks from the last fifty-or-so years, too (including an above-average number of jibes in Stephen King's direction).

On a graphical front (and the film is proudly flagged as a Sony Animation production, so nit-picking is fair game), it's got to be said that a few of the creatures look a little 'plasticky' and almost unfinished, although those moments are outnumbered by the ones which pass the bar set by most studio movies in the 21st century. While it's not the best or worst CGI you've seen recently, Sony's trumpeting certainly suggests it's their A-game. The 3D, on the other hand, skips between average and ineffectual. It's not that it's badly rendered, it just isn't used to the potential that a film like this carries.

But Goosebumps is very much a movie for the youngsters, and is very much proud of that without being patronising to its audience. It's perhaps a little throwaway, but any film which demonstrates the power of books and imagination to a new audience is a great thing, indeed (even if it does so in quite a self-serving and brand-aware sort of way). I'd have gotten even more out of the film if it had just slowed down and done fewer things more thoroughly, but then it wasn't really made for me.

Enormous fun for the right audience, if a PG-rated Jack Black comedy can win over a cynic like me, you might just enjoy it too…

Gremlins, Earth To Echo, and maybe even Paper Towns?



That's debatable, to be fair, although it's certainly going to look its best on a big screen.



I think it does.



Hmmm…



Probably not.



I didn't hear one, although the film's about 70% shrieking, so it wouldn't surprise me if a Wilhelm slipped through in one of the crowd scenes.



Level 2: Goosebumps stars Odeya Rush, who appeared in 2012's The Odd Life Of Timothy Green alongside Joel 'Uncle Owen' Edgerton.







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.

Review: Bridge of Spies

Bridge Of Spies
Cert: 12A / 141 mins / Dir. Steven Spielberg / Trailer



Ah, the Cold War, those were the days. Remember when you could have a long-term international stand-off based purely on fear, suspicion and non-racial xenophobia? The days when ideas alone were just as dangerous as actions? Y'know, before it all got a bit too heated?

Well, our Steven remembers, and he's brought us a film all about Jim Donovan, the US Insurance Lawyer who was tasked in 1960 by the government to negotiate with the Soviet/East-German authorities for the release of US spy-plane pilot, Francis Powers, in exchange for one of their captured snoops, Rudolf Abel. Armed largely with determination, an intricate understanding of American law and a compassion often absent from his colleagues in the CIA, Donovan also attempts to barter for the release of American economics student, Frederic Pryor, from the West-Germans. What? A two-for-one spy-swap, you say? But that's crazy! Will he succeed..?
Well, this is a Steven Spielberg film…

Okay, maybe I've been overly flippant about the whole thing, and Bridge of Spies is definitely a story worth telling. The film is earnestly made, and while it occasionally gets a little too hand-wringy, it's nowhere near as mawkish as the likes of War Horse. Fantastic performances from Tom Hanks (as the lawyer) and Mark Rylance (as the Soviet spy) make it all worthwhile, as do the occasional moments of wry wit. The pacing's a little patchy however, as is the notation of the passage of time.

There's also the feeling throughout that Spielberg's holding back; that a quiet respect for the factual events and the people involved is preventing this from being a more dynamic and entertaining film. At the same time, much of the political and historical minutiae is merely sketched in (as is a dazzling array of accents), so the final movie can't really be held up to Lincoln as a semi-educational piece, either.

What comes across the strongest is the story's ethical/humanitarian message, and while it's delivered from the heart, I think Spielberg may be preaching to the choir for the most part. This isn't the Oscar-bait of a January release, but nor is it an intricate legal/espionage drama in the run-up to Holiday Season.

Had it been an entirely fictional story, Bridge Of Spies could have gone further and been a great movie; although it's still a good one in the meanwhile…

For most audiences, not quite.



Unless you're a massive fan of Hanks or Rylance, this will be a rental.



Best, I couldn't say, but incredibly solid, certainly.



It does, but in a rather staid fashion.



Nope.



Nope.
(And there's one bloody perfect moment for it, too.)



Bridge of Spies is directed by that Steven Spielberg who also made those Indiana Jones movies starring that Harrison 'Solo' Ford bloke.







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.