Hatton Garden heist. True story. Dear lord. Shoddily constructed, poorly dialogued, badly acted, no direction, editing's all over the place and the soundtrack's like someone going through a pile of CDs they picked up at a car boot sale. Features more f-bombs than you can wave a BBFC examiner at, and five c-bombs (all of which are unnecessary in terms of context, emphasis and dramatic intention) yet still manages to cruise in with a 15 certificate like Guy Ritchie rebooting Last Of The Summer Wine. This crime caper is so intrinsically lazy I'm surprised they managed to finish making it. Although given the state of the final scene I think it's more that they just gave up.
Who is this film for? What's its message? If Michael Caine's criminal mastermind is the 'king of thieves', why does he feel like a secondary character in his own film? Nobody knows. Considering the budget percentage attributed to Nina Gold's address book here, it's really not good enough.
The audience I was with quite enjoyed it.
Well I haven't seen them myself, but I imagine this is fairly similar to the two other movies which already exist depicting the same heist, and the four-part TV series.
The actual robbery itself only happened in 2015, for fuck's sake. Come back this time next year and it'll have been turned into a jukebox musical to tour provincial theatres.
End of aisle. 'Gifts for Father's Day'. £3.
As above.
Well let's just say that the cast are firmly on minimum-effort autopilot, a situation director James Marsh has absolutely no intention of remedying.
Oh hell yeah.
There isn't.
Level 1: That X-Wing pilot from out of The Force Awakens is in this.
You know the one. You do. You know him.
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.
This wasn't made for me. I say that about an increasing number of films of course, but probably best to get it out of the way now. I knew this wasn't made for me long before I sat down in screen 1 of course. But when I found myself the youngest person in the auditorium, watching the flag-waving trailer for Dambusters 75 and Diane Keaton sliding towards being offered gigs doing life-insurance adverts, it was a done deal.
So imagine my utter delight*1 at the first scene of Mike Newell's The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society, beginning on the island during occupation in the Second World War, where the drunk Tom Courtenay character vomits onto the boots of a German officer while my surrounding audience chortled heartily. The film's very first gag (no pun intended) bears all the hallmarks of Brexit: The Movie, a simplified, rose-tinted, fictionalised*2 version of history that few involved are old enough to remember at all*3. And so it plays for the entirety of the first act and well into the second.
After this opening we jump to 1946, in the immediate aftermath of the war. Lily James plays Juliet Ashton, a london-based writer travelling to a fishing village on Guernsey after hearing about a secretive book-club used to keep up morale during the occupation. Once there, she finds that not all of the inhabitants are ready to be open about those years, and that the cobbled streets hold darker secrets. Meanwhile, Juliet begins to fall for the man who initially wrote to her about the Society, after finding her name in a book she once owned. Everything's slightly sepia-tinted and there's a piano and light-orchestral score. You get the picture.
Credit where it's due, Lily James leads the ensemble cast well, gives the clunky script her absolute best and is always a pleasure to watch (even if she's essentially reprising her role from Darkest Hour). However, Lily's frequently required to walk around muttering to herself and to read everything aloud, so certain is the director that the audience needs to be spoon-fed whatever remains of any subtext. Meanwhile, Katherine Parkinson seems to have been given the script from another film. Again, she's always fun to be around but her boozy, spiritualist character becomes more disparate from the setting as the run-time increases. Penelope Wilton is turned up to 10 for the duration, her wild-eyed mistrust of anyone from the mainland sure to be a hit with island communities everywhere, and Matthew Goode appears to be playing a role which has been written specifically for Jeremy Irons.
Despite the wardrobe department and set-dresser's best efforts, none of what we see feels like it's happening in 1946, but in a modern-day facsimile. The shadow of this artifice is always in-shot, with the performances spirited but ultimately a bit pantomime. There is a decent story buried beneath the layers of smugness and sanitised post-war defiance and denial, though. The strand about Jessica Brown Findlay's Elizabeth, her affair with an occupying soldier and the child they had deserves its own movie, quite honestly, suggesting that if this one took itself a bit more seriously it would have much more to offer.
The main problem (ie not just me saying "I didn't enjoy this") is that the screenplay is never quite sure which plate it should be spinning. You can have the story about how books can bring people together and inspire during dark times, you can have the story about the islander who fell in love with an enemy soldier and how their relationship was doomed from the start, or you can have the story about the wide-eyed outsider who goes off to a close-knit community and falls in love with the pig farmer*4. But choose one. The gear-change between each strand is jarring as it effectively becomes a different film each time.
Despite moments of demonstrable heart, this is nowhere near the movie it could be. 30% charming, 70% infuriating. I never thought I'd write these words, but in the hands of Richard Curtis, The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society could have been quite wonderful. But it wasn't, and it isn't.
Behind the closing credits we get an audio-track of the cast reading passages from famous novels, an attempt to remind the audience that the story was about books and convince them that they've watched something well-written.
Best bit: The start of the movie where the fledgling book-club all bond together by getting pissed on homemade gin and killing a pig.
*2 There's absolutely nothing wrong with historical fiction, of course. Most movies of this ilk can't wait to get the 'based on true events' card onto the screen, but not here. The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society is adapted from a bestselling novel, which is to say, it is made-up. And while that doesn't necessarily preclude the themes of the work being based in reality, this particular film is so far removed from the reference section that it wasn't even filmed on Guernsey. And watching the tourist board trying to spin that one is, quite frankly, fucking hilarious. [ BACK ]
*3 Although unlike Brexit, this movie has the bonus of at least being an optional pursuit.
Yeah, bit of politics there. Beiß mich. [ BACK ]
*4 With Juliet being a struggling writer, the script builds to a moment in the third act where she finds herself newly-single and back home from the island, when the inspiration finally strikes home for her to write her masterpiece (in montage-form, naturally). While she does this primarily for her own satisfaction, it's nonetheless well-received by the island natives she's grown fond of, in particular the one who still holds her heart. And it's at that point that I wished I'd just watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall instead... [ 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.
Ah, another Friday afternoon, another game of 'who's the youngest person in the audience?'. Although since the prize is a pocket-warmed Werther's Original, I think I'll pass, thanks.
And so, February sees the cinematic reinvigoration of Dad's Army creak audibly into our midst. Like many others, my heart sank when I heard the project had the go-ahead, but picked up again when I read the casting announcement. And then sank again when I saw the first trailer. This period re-tooling of a (pretty much) universally-loved TV show from the 1960s & 70s was always going to be a tricky beast to handle, being a high-watermark of classic comedy over the generations. But that doesn't seem to be a deterrent where movies are concerned, these days...
Well, the good news is, the film could have been far worse. The love and respect for the original source material shines through, and there's a feeling that the screenplay is as much a tribute to the spirit of Dad's Army as it is to the original cast. Toby Jones is quietly magnificent as Captain Mainwaring, capturing the blustering personality without devolving into a clichéd impersonation. And he's supported by players who clearly 'get' what Dad's Army is (The Inbetweeners' Blake Harrison is great as Pvt Pike too, I have to say).
And there the praise runs out, unfortunately. While the film is a pleasant enough distraction, it rarely provokes more than a smirk, never mind the chortles and guffaws which should accompany a title like this. Writer Hamish McColl seems to have taken the timeless nature of the TV series as a license to not attempt anything remotely new, and the film suffers as a result. Far from trying too hard to please 2016's audience, Dad's Army spends so much time tiptoeing around its own legacy that it forgets to be funny. The character-catchphrases are all present and correct and not flogged to death by any means, but there's still the feeling of a box being ticked each time one lands*1.
What the film left me with wasn't the feeling of a wasted opportunity, but a missed one, certainly. The film's tone suggests that this could have been so much more than a winsome cover-version, but the screenplay's content has let it down. Truth be told, this isn't a film, it's a Christmas one-off TV special coming just over a month late and in a cinema instead of your living room.
But by next Christmas, it'll be £3 on DVD, so you can safely enjoy it at home then.
Oh, and Catherine Zeta Jones' scenes have been filmed with a focus so soft that I spent half the film worrying I was developing cataracts.
If you thought the Dad's Army 'mobile phone' out-take/improv*3 was cringe-inducing, wait until you sit through the end-credits a cappella*2 ensemble sing-song of Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr Hitler.
Engineers are currently devising a way to effectively harness the near-infinite energy being created by Bud Flanagan spinning in his grave...
I have no idea. I mean, not even Dad's Army, and that's the point of it, so…
No.
No.
No.
Probably.
No.
Level 2: Dad's Army stars Toby Jones, who played Dr. Arnim Zola those Captain America movies, which also starred Sam 'Windu' Jackson.
And ironically enough, Jones' performance as Captain Mainwaring in this film seems to owe many facial ticks and mannerisms to Hugo Weaving's Red Skull in the first Cap outing Which is pretty weird when you think about it...
*1 Incidentally, Bill Paterson's scene as dour Scot, Sgt Fraser, where he gets to rhyme off his "We're doomed!" line is the only one where he acts or sounds anything like the original Sgt Fraser, suggesting either very lax direction, or that he was cast in the role purely because he was Scottish and over 65. Neither is a particularly reassuring prospect. The same goes for Bill Nighy playing Sgt Wilson as his "Bill Nighy" character, but that's hardly a surprise. Oh, and see also Michael Gambon with his "Michael Gambon" character, although I don't think a director has ever lived who could change that state of affairs.
*2 Fear not, that comes well after the original TV version of the sig-tune. Although they've still chopped the middle-eight out of it, the bastards.
*3 It's the 'turn that phone off' short which has been running in front of Cineworld movies for the last month or so, and also appears in the closing credits of the film as an out-take, of sorts. I'm also assuming it's improvised, because there's no way someone could have written something that shambolic and ill-timed.
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.
To many moviegoers, (myself included) Robert Carlyle will always be the middle-aged, foul-mouthed killer Francis Begbie from Trainspotting. Which is unfair really, as he's played a variety of other roles too, but after many years of trying to shake the image, he's finally taken the directorial reins and stars now as the middle-aged, foul-mouthed killer Barney Thomson.
This film follows the eponymous Barney, a Glaswegian barber on the verge of a mid-life crisis, whose life and sanity begin to unravel when he accidentally kills his boss moments after being sacked from his job. Because the death looks so obviously like a murder, and because the Glasgow Police are simulateously trying to track a prolific serial killer, Barney decides to get rid of the body with a minimum of fuss. It's then that help arrives from a most unexpected source…
Wonderfully scripted, acted directed and photographed, TLoBT is one of those comedies which will work best for audiences with a dry/twisted sense of humour (cf.Sightseers). In fact, it's probably not unfair to say that the collective cinematic result is far stronger than the story itself. In many ways, the film is a bit too low-key for a directorial debut and feels almost hesitant, despite its overt language, humour and ghoulish subject matter. But Carlyle shows he's really An Actor's Director, and this film is all about the performances (and in that respect, he doesn't give himself an easy ride, either). Ray Winstone plays a very good Ray Winstone as the browbeaten police inspector tracking the serial-killer case, and Emma Thompson is having a lot of fun (and brilliantly) as Barney's foul-mouthed, bingo-addicted mum. But the standout performance for me was Tom Courtenay as Chief Superintendent McManaman, whose soft, Alan Bennett-esque tones belie some of the finest comedic scripting I've heard this year.
Both visually and thematically, The Legend of Barney Thomson is very much like a head-on collision between Trainspotting and Mr Jolly Lives Next Door, and Cinematographer Fabian Wagner's camera captures the urban claustrophobia of East-end Glasgow terrifyingly well. The streets are desaturated, but the film carries enough energy that walking through them never seems like hard work (and if anything, you just want to walk faster so you can be off them). The overbearing grimness of the tale is held at bay by Carlyle's hand, and I look forward to his future projects.
It's not all plain sailing, however. As I've mentioned, the narrative itself seems almost undercooked, not quite making the leap from page to screen. I suspect the books will be just as enjoyable, but for different reasons, having time to paint the surroundings (and supporting characters) more fully. The film just about pulls it off, but you get the feeling it's scrabbling to fill its already-brief 96 minutes. Other aspects, like Barney's first-person narration, are so under-used as to be pointless.
On a more technical front, the incidental music is too loud in the mix, as is much of the background noise, and vast swathes of dialogue disappear through mumbling. And it's not the Glaswegian accents, it's the mumbling. There's the distinct possibility that it was just the audio setup in the screen, of course, but I've had no previous with the cinema in question. Oh, and shouldn't there be some sort of law against a cinema showing a 2.35:1 aspect-ratio film in a 16:9 setup auditorium? The aforementioned Mr. Wagner didn't work his bollocks off making this film look grimily fantastic so that it can be shoved on the only available screen as an afterthought, with black bars projected at the top and bottom ;)
If you only see one movie this year which features interior and exterior shots of Glasgow Barrowlands, make it The Legend of Barney Thomson.
If you can find it near you, sure. That said…
Well, as much fun as the film is, its sparse release-schedule means that you'll probably end up watching it on DVD with a bottle of wine one Sunday night; a task for which it's absolutely ideal.
Well, Robert Carlyle will always be Begbie to me, but he's also very good in this.
Given that it almost runs out of story, yes.
I won't.
There isn't.
This film stars Robert Carlyle, James Cosmo and Finlay Welsh, all three of whom appeared in 1996's Trainspotting alongside Ewan 'Kenobi' McGregor.
(All roads lead to Kenobi, today.)
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.
Hoffman's idea of direction is apparently letting the entire cast turn up and smirk over their lines. He seems torn between wanting to make a warm, twee comedy about people adapting to their later years, and showing us that the supporting cast are actual retired musicians. As a result, he concentrates on neither and we get a right old mess. Only Maggie Smith and Pauline Collins seem to have any idea why they're there. The first act is butchered down to 20 minutes, the third lacks any of the drama or emotion required, leaving a second act that couldn't drag any more if it wore a gold lamé dress, false lashes and started singing Hey Big Spender to a stag party.
Anyway, I've made a list of the reasons that it's not fucking well good enough...
• If the home (which is run as a charity, not privately funded by its residents) was cutting costs and facing closure, why would they even accept Jean as a resident, knowing she'd be moved on with the others anyway? As it turns out, the Gala Concert saves the day, and apparently a room containing no more than 100 punters paying "Covent Garden Prices" is enough to fund the home indefinitely. Don't get me wrong, we're never on the edge of our seats - The potential closure of the home is referred to twice, and defusing of this is referred to once. What should be a major plot point is barely an addendum in the script.
• There's a clunking, out-of-place, scene in the first act where Billy Connolly's Wilf: walks across a room, pauses, looks all concerned and clutchy-chest ill, says 'No, I'll... I'll be fine' and then walks on. This is never referred to again. We (the audience) think 'oh, that'll be coming back later to throw a spanner in the works!, but no. After that he's just leery and inappropriate as usual, walking with a stick but otherwise perfectly healthy.
• In an actual Scriptwriter's Boomerang scene, one of the (supporting-role) residents is seen in a summer-house-type-thing playing his clarinet when he clutches his chest, takes a pill, drops the rest of the pills, then shares a concerned look with Wilf as the medication takes effect. Again, we think 'Well, that's a funeral we'll be seeing in a moment of pathos later in the film!', and it does rear its head again, but only when the chap in question is taken to hospital one morning a few days later (much to the concern of the breakfast room), and is then never referred to again.
• Tom Courtenay's Reginald has trouble adapting the modern world (even though he's not illustrated as 'living in the past' like his contemporaries are, somehow). This is crystalised into him trying to "understand Rap Music"; namely reading a highly simplified web-page that doesn't exist and having an awkward conversation with "A Youth" who's there as part of the home's Understanding Opera course for "youths who appear to take no interest in opera". After a thoroughly embarassing 'Hey, we're not so different, you and I' tête-à-tête, Tom is, I can only assume, Down With The Kids. There is no reason for him to want to understand The Rap, and his newfound knowledge is not utilised in any way. This thread is never referred to again (although the aforementioned Youth does appear in the audience of the Gala Concert, presumably paying Covent Garden Prices for his ticket).
• In the final act, we're waiting for some hitherto unforseen revelation about Maggie Smith and Tom Courtenay's past that'll lead to the last-minute 'Oh! But they're about to go on-stage!!!' tension. This doesn't happen. Instead, those two are wrapped up with next to no actual resolution, and Pauline Collins' Cissy goes from "forgetful and slightly dotty" to "full-on Alzheimer's" over the course of ten minutes, threatening to derail the finalé-performance. But it's okay, Jean talks her round and everything is fine and they do the concert the end.
• 'Hello? Is that Michael Gambon? I'm casting a new film which is sort of St Trinian's with pensioners, and wondered if you could come in to play a supporting role as a sort of comic-relief, sweary, bad-tempered Dumbledore? ...No, that's literally all you'll have to do. You can? brilliant!' *click*
• There's been much said in the pre-release press about the supporting cast of Quartet being actual retired musicians and singers. To be honest, it adds a nice air of authenticity to the musical performances, but it also underlines the fact that they're not retired actors. Ne'er mind. However, to pay tribute to these good folks, the closing credits of the film are run alongside then-and-now pictures of the them, detailing achievements in their careers (eg English National Opera, Royal Philharmonic, what have you). As the credits roll, this is giving a great insight to these 'anonymous' performers, until the actual cast start being listed as well. They show a photo of the young Andrew Sachs with the credit 'Fawlty Towers, 1975-79'. Er.. I fucking know who Andrew Sachs is. I don't think we need him listed with the unknown talent, do we? And if you must do that, wouldn't you quote part of his stage career, rather than the role he played as a comedy waiter in the 1970's? They haven't used a photo of him from that era, so why that credit? I love Fawlty Towers as much as the next guy, but it's not exactly the Royal National Ballet, is it? In the context of this film, it's largely fucking irrelevant, in fact.
• Why is the pre-press propping the director 'Academy Award Winner Dustin Hoffman' when the pre-press is also pointing out that it's his directorial debut? That'd be like having a plumber arrive at your house who's never installed a toilet before, but he has got a 'Gold 50 Metres Swimming Award!'. Pretty much irrelevant to the job in hand, especially as Quartet suggests Hoffman would have trouble directing traffic on a one-way street.
I expect better from everyone involved, with the possible exception of Smith, and even she's on autopilot.
Yes.
Occasionally.
No.
Telly.
No.
Never.
No.
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.
