I know what you're thinking, because I was thinking that too. "What's that? A terrorist-plot in Paris and only one wry, laconic American cop with the unlikeliest of sidekicks can save the day? Why is Idris Elba on the poster of what's clearly a Liam Neeson film?". Well, you can relax. This isn't the Liam Neeson film I feared it would be. Although it is very much the Bruce Willis film I'd have been fearing before Neeson stuck his foot in the door of the genre. There have been several movies in recent years billed as 'Die Hard in the [Insert Building Name Here]', but none have borrowed quite so liberally and transparently from the format as James Watkins' Bastille Day. So it's a good job that the film is quite enjoyable really, isn't it?
Yes, it was as much of a shock to me as it no doubt is to you, dear reader, when I found myself chortling and wincing along with Elba and Richard Madden as they speed around the back streets of Paris trying to unravel a thoroughly unfeasible conspiracy woven through anarchists, security forces and weaponised hashtags*1. The film begins with some interesting ideas (particularly in today's climate) on social unrest and political agitation, which are handled fairly well if not particularly delicately. But by the time that naive-hustler Mason (Madden) and gruff-cop Briar (Elba) have joined forces to track down naive bomb-mule Zoe (Charlotte Le Bon) and Save The Day™, the whole thing descends into a sort of reliable silliness.
Which isn't to say that the film is particularly playful with its subject, but as the script goes on you become aware that you're not watching a political-thriller, you're watching an action-flick. It's just nice to see issues of xenophobia handled without resorting to... well, xenophobia, frankly. It would have been easier for the script to take a far more mean-spirited approach to the plot mechanics. That it doesn't works in its favour, enormously.
But back at surface-level, Idris Elba gives good screen-time and has a comfortable chemistry with Richard Madden. Charlotte Le Bon's character feels a little under-used, but nowhere near as much as Kelly Reilly's back-room CIA agent. On the other side of the dramatic fence, Thierry Godard and José Garcia twirl their moustaches effectively enough, while almost everyone else is a character-archetype. But it's really that sort of film, so no major harm done.
Bastille Day isn't going to win any awards, but nor is it going to raise many hackles, either. Remarkably good fun, considering the content, but you can get back to the actual Acting™ now Idris, yeah?
Oh, and extra points for getting British actors Idris Elba, Richard Madden and Kelly Reilly to affect American accents for the entire film. They're unsteady, but passable enough (which is more than can be said for...); there's just no need for them other than the plot deciding that the characters should be American for plot-reasons. I don't believe I've ever written this before (certainly not in relation to an action-movie), but is there a shortage of US actors?That said, I am genuinely thankful that French performers appear to have been cast for the French roles (although by all means pick me up if I'm wrong on that).
All Of The Car Chases and All Of The Shooting™.
As much fun as I had, it's a bit of a £5 DVD, if I'm being entirely honest.
Just about, yeah.
Not really, but I don't think it's meant to be.
Nah.
There isn't. Which is ridiculous in a film like this.
Level 1: Bastille Day stars James Cox, who performed stunt-work in The Force Awakens and the upcoming Rogue One. And sure, he's a 'stunt' actor, but he actually plays someone named "Pierre" in this, which is more than most of the incidental cast get. Yeah, I'm looking at you, Caolan McClafferty aka "French Vegetarian". Honestly, who's going to put that on their CV? Not Caolan, I'll wager.
^^ That's a five because I enjoyed it, mind you, not because it's particularly good ;)
*1 No, for real. At one point, a bigwig in the 'baddies' organisation looks at the imminent rioting on TV and says "They're ready to go... the hashtags will tip them over!", which is fucking priceless. It's a level of Da*ly Ma*l techno-paranoia that does the film absolutely no favours, but it made me laugh out loud, and at least it's not a major plot point. That said, the phrase "digital currency" rears its head about half an hour later, but is handled by the script as if no-one really understands Bitcoin enough to go any further. Thankfully.
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.
The Walk (3D)
Cert: PG / 123 mins / Dir. Robert Zemeckis / Trailer
Not convinced by the trailer? Don't worry, I wasn't either. I struggled to see how Robert Zemeckis was going to make a compelling movie about a subject which is already documented on pageandon film. But The Walk is much more than a series of escalating events (no pun intended), instead it gets inside the head - and heart - of wire-walker Philippe Petit, and ends up being three movies in one.
The first act follows Philippe through his childhood and adolescence, showing his fascination with performance acrobatics first in rural France, then to Paris, and his idea for the World Trade Centre walk. From the very beginning, Zemeckis is keen to highlight that this is a true story, with a massive title card informing the audience of such. And yet this section of the film is also the least convincing, as the director employs an array of techniques to keep pulling the viewer out of the story and create a strong sense of artiface; be it the fourth-wall-breaking on-screen dialogue from Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Petit as he narrates the major points of his life from the top of an astoundingly false looking Statue of Liberty*1, the black-and-white scenes with bursts of colour injected, Ben Kingsley's voice*2, or even just the heavily stylised filming of the scenes which aren't designed to catch your eye, particularly. At this point, it almost feels like Zemeckis is saying that the truth of the story isn't enough, that it has to be embellished with spectacle and exaggeration. It doesn't bode well, and I still wasn't convinced.
However, once Philippe arrives permanently in New York and begins assembling a team of accomplices to help him achieve his unauthorised and highly-illegal walk between the towers, the film becomes an energetic heist-movie, not unlike American Hustle, complete with JGL donning a number of disguises as he cases the still-incomplete South Tower with a view to infiltrating it with all of his wire-apparatus. It's at this point that the chemistry between Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Charlotte Le Bon really kicks in, and they're fantastic together even if their combined screen-time is relatively short. This is also the act which features the comic relief from the misfits Philippe recruits, partly because of their skills, but also through sheer desperation. Additionally, it's here that the director seems to delight in homaging his own Back To The Future movies*3, as he's already got Alan Silvestri to score the film, and then goes on to show his love of a) ominous thunderstorms in the lead-up to a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, b) fascinatingly detailed architectural maquettes, painstakingly over-built to illustrate only one point, and c) steel cables and ratchets. Lots of ratchets. The heist-act is a lot of fun, by this point I was well onboard.
But it's act-three, the final stretch, the walk itself, which everyone's come for and this is where Zemeckis really shines. The Walk becomes a film not about the technicalities of stringing a wire between two buildings, nor about the adulation and amazement coming from the streets below while that's done, but about the performance art itself. About testing your own limits and doing something unique purely because you can (with a lot of help from your friends, of course). Far from being the hyper-tense tale of hubris that the trailer hints at, it's a film about freedom on a personal and artistic level. Philippe refers to the planning and execution of his walk as le coup, but despite the authorities (eventually) becoming involved, there's nothing either political or egotistical about his actions; it's just something he has to do for himself.
Then, almost as a post-script to the story, Zemeckis' film deftly delivers a metaphorical love-letter to the Twin Towers, but again it's a one which manages to steer well clear of any mawkishness or politics somehow; not mourning their loss, but just celebrating their existence. A carefully crafted final sequence shows the towers as beacons of hope and possibility, of Philippe's dream and everything he did to achieve it. A reminder that people may think you're crazy (in fact, you very well might be), but all the time it's your dream, you're the only one who can chase it properly. And a reminder that the best art is created for the sake of art itself.
The unspoken fate of the buildings aside, any film which can make a wooly-yet-cynical liberal like me misty-eyed over two monuments to naked, unabashed capitalism - in today's climate - is doing something very right, indeed.
Go and see The Walk...
It is, and in 3D as well. There a fewer 'fairground thrill-simulator shots' in there than you'd think (although there are several, obviously), but much like The Martian, this is one of the rare examples of a live-action movie which looks great in 3D.
Seriously, much of the effect will be lost on the small screen (unless your telly's massive), but this will be one to buy. Once the price drops, naturally.
Accent quibbles aside, JGL's on great form here.
More than.
Probably not…
There isn't.
Which is ridiculous, because there is the perfect spot for it, too.
The film stars James Badge Dale and Ben Kingsley, both of whom appeared in Iron Man 3, along with Jon 'Pre Vizsla' Favreau.
*1 And like I said, this first act is specifically designed to not be a documentary, but how come in some of the shots of Petit narrating, the wind machine's turned on to simulate standing exposed to the elements 150 feet in the air, but in other's it's not and everything's just deathly still? I know I'm not meant to believe it Zemeckis, but you could at least pretend you're trying to convince me…
*2 Oh, and fair play to Kingsley here as Petit's mentor and trainer, Rudy. Levitt's introductory narration tells us that "Papa Rudy never said exactly where he was from…", which gives Ben carte blanche to employ a wildly-roaming non-specific European drawl for the rest of the film, which seems to change with each scene he's in. Half of me suspects that this is a deliberate tie-in with his advice to Philippe when he tells him "Never be insincere on stage, it must come from here. The audience will know if you're lying". Because for all his shop-demonstration-mode vocal acrobatics, he plays his role perfectly (more importantly, his accent doesn't matter, although JGL's might)…
*3 There's also a sort of homage to 1985's Ghostbusters too, in the form of people standing on the streets of New York, looking at the top of a building they can't really see properly and ooh-ing and aah-ing. Although this is less of an intentional reference than an unavoidable one, I suspect.
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.
