Thursday 1 December 2011
Tuesday 1 November 2011
Wednesday 5 October 2011
Get your reviews and movie news on Sal's Famous ...
If you're a fresher, veteran or alumni of the University of Leicester and you want to get your views aired on Sal's Famous movie blog then get in touch ...
Find the Film & Visual Arts Univeristy of Leicester Film Society group on Facebook ... or email mh290@le.ac.uk to join the blogosphere ...
It's all good fun, it's good for your CV and it's good for limbering up your writing and prose skills ...
Make haste go forth and blog !
UoL History of Art & Film Reps x
Tuesday 4 October 2011
Friday 30 September 2011
Thursday 22 September 2011
Matt Henshaw's Adventures In Wonderland: Road Trip back to Leicester ...
Matt Henshaw's Adventures In Wonderland: Road Trip back to Leicester ...: What a pleasant journey ... What a pleasant city ... What a bloody mare !!! And it was only a quick drop off gangster heist type thi...
Saturday 3 September 2011
Tuesday 30 August 2011
Tuesday 16 August 2011
Wednesday 10 August 2011
Monday 8 August 2011
Thursday 4 August 2011
Tuesday 2 August 2011
Monday 1 August 2011
Saturday 30 July 2011
Jennifer Lawrence to co-star in The Silver Linings Playbook ...
I'm going to post up some news stories that I wrote whilst interning at TotalFilm.com ... I hope you enjoy them ...
Jennifer Lawrence to co-star in The Silver Linings Playbook ...
Jennifer Lawrence to co-star in The Silver Linings Playbook ...
Thursday 14 July 2011
The Tree of Life (2011) Review
Preface
Firstly, I'd like to point out that I feel 100% inadequate in reviewing this film. It's tough, to watch, to write about, to think about, to enjoy, but that doesn't stop me from believing it to be one of the best films of the year, probably the decade and it will no doubt be the bane, or pleasure, of any film student for years to come ... I hope you can make sense of my review ...
Synopsis
We are introduced to the O’Brien family, man, wife and three young sons in 1950s Texas. Skip forward to the parents receiving communication one of their teenage son’s death before a funeral takes place. A further skip forward to another of the sons in modern America surrounded skyscrapers reflecting on his life past and present and his place in the universe. Visiting his thoughts we see impressionistic visions of the birth of the universe, the evolution of life and his own fragmented memories childhood. The boys learn two ways through life from their parents suggested by voice-overs pondering the meaning of life. The mother silently and endlessly nurtures them and the father adversely teaches them harsh life lessons and attempts to toughen them up through pugilism, punishment and discipline. He is a failed pianist working at an oil company chasing patents for his ideas; this takes him around the world. In his absence the boys embrace a sense of freedom and eldest son develops an instantly regretful underlying wayward streak engaging in vandalism, theft and bullying of his younger brother in envious light of his artistic talents. The father returns and upon finding out his plant is to be closed the family must move from their home. In the present day who we now know to be the eldest son walks through a door frame in the desert and appears to be in a kind of dream like place where all the characters from his past are preserved at a younger age.
Review
The breadth and scope of Terrence Malick’s latest epic tone poem is grandiose and ostentatious yet at times subtle and almost subliminal in its more quiet and sombre moments. The film is a majestic and rapturous paen to the indecipherable wonders of the cosmos and an ode to memories of 1950s Americana; memories you would presume to those of the director, anyone alive before swathes of American youth disappeared for the mass armageddon in south east Asia and the faux nostalgia so finely mass marketed in the age of post millennia consumerism. Pierced from start to finish by startlingly non-CGI images of the formation of the universe and the beauty of life on Earth as we know it The Tree of Life is a sparse tale of the small town Texan O’Brien brothers torn between following the life paths of an overbearing austere father - a beyond competent portrayal from Brad Pitt that warrants every portion of hyperbole bestowed upon it - and their graceful mother - an interchangeably elegant then elegiac performance from Jessica Chastain.
Book-ended by snatches of a restrained presentation in body language by Sean Penn in an attempt to bond the bulk of the action to the modern age of urban metropolises and tightly packed skyscrapers. Opening with an on screen quote from the Book of Job and settling at its close in the kingdom of heaven through the doors of perception the film is heavy on the Old Testament and at times laboured with its biblical proportions, however, it is the camera’s paganistic worship of the sun that is most striking. Shot as it is throughout the film through the trees, the wings of a butterfly and the spray of a hose Emmanuel Lubezki captures that that is all life giving and is in reverie of its truly altruistic nature. The narrative unfolds as traces of memories in eldest brother Jack O’Brien’s head as he comes to terms with his place in the universe, the complex love of his individual parents and the death of his younger brother as a teenager twenty to thirty years on. Therefore we see the sun through the eyes of a young prepubescent boy, as the Egyptians, Babylonians and the ancient pious would have seen the sun, as the central cast pose breathy questions in the voice over as if it were the Sun of God/the Light of God.
In the voice over Chastain’s mother character sets up the duality that belies the film, the choice between the way of love through strong Christian notions of evangelism (the mother) and the way nature through harsh realities and punishment (the father). Perhaps though the realisation of the forty something Jack is that in the face of the grandeur of the planets and the vastness of space, morality and the choice between love and fear, as Bill Hicks would describe is some what irrelevant and places Jean Paul Satre’s existentialist ponderings in the 1950s before science would start taking leaping strides from the 1960s through to the 21st century; a time when the skies truly were the final frontier ie. “the place where God lives” and the USA was building the new Holy Roman Empire.
Almost impeccably edited the film is completed by a score from Alexandre Desplat who takes in 500 years of western classical music and bridges four eras with a dense collection of composers. The best parts bear more than similarity to Kubrick’s 2001 yet, possibly to avoid parody the soundtrack employs pieces less likely to induce cliché than that of 2001 or Disney’s classically laden Fantasia. The father plays the baroque organ pieces of JS Bach from a time when music and art was only commissioned at the behest of the church tying him to the idea of expression through wages and the admiration of art living within your means rather than the graceful romanticism that resonates with the mothers elegance and spirituality, or the ever revived Agnus Dei movement of the Requiem Mass for the Dead. That said you would be forgiven in wanting to watch the the inner planetary sequences with the voice-overs muted whilst listening to Gustav Holst’s Planets Suite or watch the nature and evolution set pieces expecting to hear David Attenborough summarise its visual splendour in a few crisp monologues. With Hector Berlioz playing out over the evolution of the universe and Johannes Brahms and Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky in the family home the film and its accompanying soundtrack are anything but modest in their ambition, but perhaps knowingly so of its place in time and space.
Addendum
Just go and watch it.
Wednesday 1 June 2011
Scarface (1983) Special Edition DVD – Universal Studios Home Entertainment (2004) under review ...
Scarface (1983) Special Edition DVD – Universal Studios Home Entertainment (2004)
Special Features
- · The Rebirth Of Scarface development featurette
- · Acting Scarface featurette
- · Creating Scarface 'making of' documentary
- · Scarface: The TV Version comparison featurette
- · Deleted scenes (22 mins)
- · Origins Of A Hip-Hop Classic documentary
- · Theatrical and teaser trailers
If ever there was a film that had the kind of cult following that consisted of ever youthful admirers who always wanted to know more about its inception and legacy, and its cast and its creators then Scarface surely is that film. Brian De Palma’s classic film, a successfully remake of an old-time gangster classic, splurges a big fat ink stain in all the suitable boxes and portrays the scurrilous pursuit of the American dream with such a gritty bludgeon like no other film ever has, before or since. Cart-wheeling through hoop after hoop to impress the male psyche we are treated to a melange of guns, breasts and violence, drugs, chainsaws and tigers.
Tony Montana arrives in Miami, Florida, USA from Cuba pronouncing himself as “a political refugee”. He climbs through the cocaine fuelled gangster underworld claiming he wants everything that he’s got coming to him; “the world chico, and everything in it”. It’s a masterfully theatrical performance from Al Pacino who asserts his credence and trustworthiness succinctly, becoming the envy of alpha male and living out a few man’s dreams when he says “I’ve only got two things in this world: my word and my balls, and I don’t break ‘em for nobody” in the face of a South American drug baron. It’s definitely Oliver Stone’s script and Pacino’s portrayal of Montana, both with deftly touched with a subtle hint of humour that endears us to the lead character and the expected demise of Montana leads us to the unexpected sombre ending of his bloodied carcass lying face down in his overblown entrance hall fountain. Were we expected to be sad at the death of our new favourite caricature?
The sets are lavish and the colours are unflinchingly coarse (I’m sure this movie has inspired more than a few ghastly makeovers in those with the taste and mindsets of Delboy Trotter). Producer Martin Bregman had clearly spent greatly to realise the dreams of the Cuban gangster as he reaches the top of the cocaine pyramid; that is symbolised quite literally by a mound of cocaine in one of the closing scenes looks like a snow capped mountain top before Montana throws his face into it.
The soundtrack is a mix of electro 80s chart fodder and Giorgio Moroder’s synth noodlings that run the risk of being overbearing at certain intervals. This can be enjoyed; or not, in Dolby 5.1 surround on the Special Edition DVD. Which brings us nicely the double disc sets special features.
An excellent extra is a short piece on how Universal managed to edit the original film to be suitable for network TV in America. Just how they managed to cope with all the nudity and violence is one thing, but the 160 f-words and the other language is another. There’s also a short from pioneering black record label Def Jam Recordings chronicling the link to rap/hip-hop culture and the 80s movie. There’s the revelation that P Diddy has seen the film 63 times, and it’s probably more since the recording of the interview. We receive a real insight into the funding, production of the film and the method acting style of Al Pacino.
Plus, there’s the usual DVD fodder such as trailers and deleted scenes (that you can’t help but always think “they must have been deleted for a reason, so why show them now?”). But, what is a real treat is the set of shorts that document the making of the film – The Rebirth of Scarface, Acting Scarface and Creating Scrface.
But what this film is really crying out for is a commentary from one or more, or all of the main players. They’re all here on the DVD; sit them in a room together for a few hours and maybe even record their conversation as the film plays. I don’t know?! Even if it takes a few bags of white powder I think it should be done and I’m sure it’s what every die-hard fan would love to hear accompanying their favourite film. No doubt the imminent release of the Blu-Ray edition of the film will be gobbled up with the usual whether this is featured or not. Whatever the case may be, this is a highly entertaining film, and the DVD set includes some highly entertaining extra material.
Monday 2 May 2011
Following review
Synopsis
(In chronological order, the film is shown as a fragmented narrative out of sequence)
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
London, 1998. An unemployed would-be writer Bill begins following random people. A suave character named Cobb confronts him in a cafe. Cobb has noticed that Bill has been following him. Cobb tells Bill that he is a burglar. He convinces Bill to follow him some more so as to demonstrate his methods of breaking and entering. Cobb tells Bill that he does it for the adrenalin rush and finding people’s secrets.
After breaking into the house of a blonde woman with Cobb, Bill smartens up and begins following her. Later, after chatting her up in a bar, a relationship ensues. She convinces Bill to steal some photographs from the office of her ex-boyfriend claiming he has been using them to blackmail her. Upon doing this Bill uses a hammer to injure a heavy that catches him in the act.
Returning to the blonde with the innocuous photographs and a large amount of money she reveals that she and Cobb had been framing him all along for a murder that Cobb was suspected of committing. Bill reports everything to the police. However, in the meantime Cobb has murdered the blonde with Bill’s hammer, framing Bill and stopping the blonde from going to the police herself to inform them of a murder committed by her ex-boyfriend, who is revealed to be Cobb’s boss. The police have no knowledge of the previous murder case or a suspect named Cobb. Cobb vanishes into the crowded streets.
Review
With Christopher Nolan’s latest “smart”, “quirky” and “edgy” thriller Inception scorching an impenetratable blaze of a trail on 3D screens worldwide, and the third part of his impressively crescendoing Batman trilogy perched on the horizon, taking a look back at his first feature length directorial debut you may notice that he might have lost a smidgen of his original charm along the way. Following opened in late ‘98 to less than a whimper in the UK, but elsewhere received the kind of plaudits and accolades that were enough to lure Nolan - one of Britain's brightest young talents in years - away from our shores to Hollywood. This film sadly remains the only one from this British director to be set in a British location.
What did the British film industry and critics miss? All the clues to Nolan’s future style are there in a purer form. The fragmented narrative gives the director chance to flex his admirable storytelling pecks seen later time and time again. Obviously a studious filmmaker harking back to likes of Bogdanovich, Scorsese and the directors of the ‘70’s “New Hollywood” film school generation Nolan excels in presenting the conventions of a classic film noir using only found lighting to illuminating effect, even without any formal education. The subtle changes in light and dark from scene to scene convey all the atmosphere necessary to accommodate the, at times, lacklustre acting. The levels of acting (and overacting) have varied through the director’s films thus far: from this collection of rookies putting together scenes just slightly above that of an amateur dramatic theatre group to a supreme show in scenery chewing from Al Pacino, or from master classes of playing yourself from Michael Caine to the deadpan Guy Pearce, well suited to Memento.
It is also a deadpan naturalistic style that is present here, and with Memento, it matters little, as the characters seem to be so well-developed, and ready for the audience to invest themselves into their story. Like Cobb, the viewer gains such a sense of Bill from a simple look at his flat that they are ready to follow him and those he follows in turn. Intertextuality abounds, from Jack Nicholson and Marilyn Monroe postcards stuck on the wall to the stolen Trainspotting soundtrack CD and the Batman sign on his door, a coincidental sign of things to come. With the first of his Batman films, this ideal of character development is still just about there, but, by the time we reach his second instalment all subtlety of this kind is dropped for explosions, the changing of actresses to comply with studio schedules and incongruent change in the timbre of the protagonist’s voice. And with Inception various plot devices and character’s arcs are thrown at us with the subtlety of a sledgehammer amongst more explosions and mind (and screen) bending imagery, but surely Nolan couldn’t have forgotten the depth he invested in his earlier characters as he gives Leonardo Di Caprio’s character the name Cobb, the very same name as the suave villain of his debut picture.
Probably the clearest example of Nolan’s switch from bright young thing to the producer of Hollywood blockbusters is the fight scene in the centre of Following. It is a truly British affair. The Hugh Grant-style flailing nature of it is that which many English people are ashamed to admit is true to form. It blends into the London skyline very well, even having a choreographer, it is a far cry from the supremely co-ordinated floating Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Inception. Yet, what this film sacrifices in polish and continuity it gains in charm, originality and, for the time, a fresh look at a genre that Hollywood was content in churning out glossy pastiches like L.A. Confidential (featuring a deadpan Guy Pearce no less). Themes present in Following were also becoming common in other US films of the late nineties, like Sam Mendes in American Beauty questioning life and material values and David Fincher, who - like Nolan - toys with existential ideas along the way in Fight Club. It’s no surprise then that Hollywood snapped up the young writer/director, shame then that Nolan was in England long enough to give us this picture alone. “You take it away, and you show them what they had.”
Monday 4 April 2011
Touch of Evil review
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
The US/Mexico border, a bomb is planted in a car as Miguel Vargas and his new wife Susie are crossing over into America. Vargas, a Mexican official, realizes the negative diplomatic implications of a Mexican bomb exploding on American soil and begins to investigate. Police Captain Hank Quinlan and his partner Pete Menzies, arrive on the scene of the explosion. When it becomes clear that Quinlan has planted evidence to frame a young Mexican named Sanchez, Vargas begins to gather evidence of his own in an attempt to expose the captain.
While Vargas is investigating Quinlan's corruption, Susie is cooped up in a remote motel that gets taken over by gang members of the Grandi family, who Vargas is fighting as a law enforcement official, and who is secretly also a criminal associate of Quinlan. Susie is kidnapped by the gang, injected with drugs, and taken to Grandi’s hotel in town. There, Quinlan seizes an opportunity, strangles Grandi and frames Susie Vargas for the murder in order to ruin her husband. Meanwhile, Vargas confronts Menzies claiming that the evidence in all the cases they ever solved was fabricated. Eventually Vargas persuades Menzies to record a conversation with Quinlan. After the police captain admits to planting evidence, he realises Menzies is wearing a wire and shoots him only to be shot in return, leaving Vargas able to exonerate his wife.
Review
“Don’t you see you don’t help yourself by treating this as a joke?” exclaims Charlton Heston as Miguel Vargas, and it would have probably been a complaint oft-repeated at Orson Welles throughout his career in the movie business. For it is at Welles’ character - the villainous, obese and sinister police Captain Quinlan - that this line of dialogue is directed. And with his usual acting aplomb, Welles dismisses the comment with “Are you finished? Anything more you wanna say, Vargas?” almost definitely the way Welles would have repeatedly reacted in the face of many of his real life detractors. For there is an air of greatness surrounding this film and, indeed, it smacks of brilliance but ultimately flounders in it. It has all the hallmarks of Orson Welles’ cinematography, style and wit in the direction, yet, aside from two major scenes, there is a distinct lack of the all encompassing innovative quality that thrusts Citizen Kane into the debates about greatest films of all-time.
It is in the undercurrent of humour, whether intentional or not, juxtaposed against the gravely dark thriller elements ofTouch of Evil that it is perhaps where the film falls down. The black comedy is prevalent throughout the film, although thankfully not in any of the key scenes. It could have worked well, as Hitchcock proved with his mastery of the darkly humorous thrillers of the same period. In every scene, apart from the his brutal final shot the Mexican mob boss, Grandi, played by Akim Tarimoff, is comically overacted, more attuned to a bit-part in the mafia spoofing Analyze This and Analyze That films. Similarly, the mentally handicapped night manager at the motel seems to have jumped straight from a Mel Brooks film.
Mentioning Alfred Hitchcock and motels it would be rude not to reference Psycho made just two years later, and with the same leading lady. Janet Leigh’s visit to the Bates’ Motel in 1960 delivers some of the most incredibly eerie scenes and one of the most memorable murders in cinema history, and the film manages to carry a perverse sense of humour continuously without it undermining any of its integrity. The scene in which Leigh’s character Susie Vargas is drugged and potentially raped is sinister enough, yet its tension could have been heightened by not having the cutaways to the unnecessarily stupefied night manager in the motel reception, and the crass rock ’n’ roll music that plays out diagetically through the speaker in the room. The rock ‘n’ roll music and boogie-woogie piano is a recurring theme through the film, detracting somewhat from the orchestral stabbings at moments of heightened anxiety, it also induces some of the strangest dancing/gyrating from one of the gangster extras that it instantly kills off any apprehension or fear. Among the black comedy there is also a half-hearted attempt to add a sort of sexual tension, but the scene of Leigh in her négligé on the phone to her new husband seems awkwardly tacked in; again, the effect is achieved more successfully two years later with the peep-hole scene in Psycho.
Where the film does work is in its two most memorable set-pieces. The three minute twenty tracking shot opening the film is unflinchingly ambitious in its scale and scope and sets up what should be a sensational movie experience. And the murder scene is so fabulously presented that any audience would produce audible gasps -Welles’ acting is so convincing that we genuinely fear the corrupt law enforcer in his remaining scenes. Although it is perhaps a great shame that if Welles didn’t treat his career in the Hollywood film studios with such contempt, and as such “a joke”, it could have been as successfully remembered in the same breath as his own Citizen Kane and Hitchcock’s Psycho.
Review by Matt Henshaw
Tuesday 15 March 2011
Scarface (1983) Review
Almost thirty years after its original theatrical release, the brash eighties remake of Howard Hawks’ pioneering 1932 gangster movie Scarface has become a part of film, youth and criminal culture to such a degree that it almost seems redundant to question those who revel in reverence of it. But why is this film held in such high esteem? I’ll tell you why; because it is a film that pulls together a plethora of unassuming components to create an era defining spectacle that sits pretty (or ugly) in the middle of the eighties; between Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull – a glorious adios to the brooding dramatic cinema of the seventies in 1980 – and 1990’s Goodfellas, which welcomed the quicker paced editing-driven movies of the nineties.
So, what of the parts? Screenwriter Oliver Stone delivers an overwritten hodgepodge of ideas and unsubtle one-liners as a script. It has an over-long running time of almost three hours. The direction from Brian De Palma is clunky and cliché ridden. The soundtrack’s grotesque, grandiose electro-pop marathon gives any discerning listener a headache; and Giorgio Moroder’s synth bursts have dated the movie so badly that – lacking the operatic finesse of a film ten years older – it seems more aged than its gangster-canon predecessor The Godfather. The acting is over-the-top and most of this precipitates from Al Pacino as the malevolent lead character Tony Montana.
Perversely, it’s the combination of these negative elements that cause it to be a classic: The script delivers some of the most memorable and oft-quoted lines in cinema history (“Say ‘hello’ to my little friend!”) and is often cited as one of Stone’s great early achievements. The film never feels long in play and always seems like a good way to while away any afternoon or evening. The music – such as Paul Engemann’s ‘Push It to the Limit’ about chasing the American dollar featuring lo-tech drum machines – characterises the era of the movie so adeptly that it would be impossible to imagine it with any other tuneful splurges. Lead actresses Michelle Pfeiffer and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio give performances that would elevate them both to the status of leading ladies in future films. And Al Pacino’s tragicomic anti-hero Tony Montana has, for better or worse, had movie-goers obsessed with the character since his inception almost thirty years ago.
The continued success of this movie could almost stand as an argument for the idea that a collection of wrongs just might make a right. *****
Review by Matt Henshaw
So, what of the parts? Screenwriter Oliver Stone delivers an overwritten hodgepodge of ideas and unsubtle one-liners as a script. It has an over-long running time of almost three hours. The direction from Brian De Palma is clunky and cliché ridden. The soundtrack’s grotesque, grandiose electro-pop marathon gives any discerning listener a headache; and Giorgio Moroder’s synth bursts have dated the movie so badly that – lacking the operatic finesse of a film ten years older – it seems more aged than its gangster-canon predecessor The Godfather. The acting is over-the-top and most of this precipitates from Al Pacino as the malevolent lead character Tony Montana.
Perversely, it’s the combination of these negative elements that cause it to be a classic: The script delivers some of the most memorable and oft-quoted lines in cinema history (“Say ‘hello’ to my little friend!”) and is often cited as one of Stone’s great early achievements. The film never feels long in play and always seems like a good way to while away any afternoon or evening. The music – such as Paul Engemann’s ‘Push It to the Limit’ about chasing the American dollar featuring lo-tech drum machines – characterises the era of the movie so adeptly that it would be impossible to imagine it with any other tuneful splurges. Lead actresses Michelle Pfeiffer and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio give performances that would elevate them both to the status of leading ladies in future films. And Al Pacino’s tragicomic anti-hero Tony Montana has, for better or worse, had movie-goers obsessed with the character since his inception almost thirty years ago.
The continued success of this movie could almost stand as an argument for the idea that a collection of wrongs just might make a right. *****
Review by Matt Henshaw
Friday 4 March 2011
The Social Network redux review
With the film’s recent Oscar disappointment next to the triumph of the Kings Speech’s, there’s no better time to review the merits of 2010’s oxymoronic worst idea for and best film. Next to Tom Hooper’s tale of perseverance and triumph over the typical Oscar ingredient of disability, The Social Network offered no answer to Zuckerberg’s borderline asperger’s social ineptness. The opening scene, featuring the fastest dialogue since His Girl Friday by West Wing scribe Aaron Sorkin sees Zuckerberg compared to “dating a stairmaster”. It’s a brilliant comparison because Jesse Eisenberg’s speech patterns exist in monologue rather than dialogue, ignoring the attentions of girlfriend Erica(Rooney Mara, in a brief but crucial role.) The electronic style pitter patter that forms much of our daily Facebook conversation was born out of social abnormalities we supposedly avoid- an irony that director David Fincher adores. Poking his voyeuristic camera into the backrooms of deplorable Harvard parties and bored blogging students, it’s a dark reflection of our own love of the thrill of Facebook stalking. Perhaps too dark for the academy, it’s a film which says far more about its viewers than any other film release of the century so far.
Crucially, it’s too a film with an emotional centre namely in the relationship between Zuckerberg and co- founder of Facebook Eduardo Saverin (played sympathetically by Andrew Garfield). As with Fincher from Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman in Se7en to Pitt and Edward Norton in Fight Club, it features the breakdown of a good male friendship on a grand scale. Zuckerberg’s dark third act ousting of Saverin from the company is brutal and marks a dramatic highpoint in Fincher’s career in a violent emotional outpouring of Garfield. Yet crucially Eisenberg whilst prickly never makes Zuckerberg completely cocksure and displays a lack of faith in his most harmful decisions. Like Charles Foster Kane and other film icons before him, he is an ambitious man at the cost of those few dear to him and himself. There is indeed more implication on second viewing that one endlessly quotable line sums it up: “Your not an asshole, just trying too hard to be one”.
If one target of Fincher’s is the socially underdeveloped nerds who run the world now, another is that of the elitist society which bores vengeful geeks like Zuckerberg. The hilarious Harvard elite Winklevoss twins(both played by Armie Hammer) offer consistent comic relief as a well as an expose of a supposedly classless American society. Accusing Zuckerberg of ‘intellectual property theft’ after he alters their idea into his own Facebook, their numerous political wrangling are comic highlights of the film. From their already immortal line “I’m 6, 5, 220 and there’s two of me” to their manner of trying to politely accost Zuckerberg through the 'gentleman' politics of Harvard law , it’s observational as well as hilarious. On the other end of the spectrum for Zuckerberg, is the freewheeling Napster founder Sean Parker(played with energetic ease by Justin Timberlake) who best appeals to Zuckerberg’s ideology. In one scene, Parker seduces Zuckerberg over shots in a nightclub to encourage user growth and delay advertisers as its “uncool”. Zuckerberg’s idolatry of Parker’s social ease and pseudo rapport with face book users is all that comes close to revealing Zuckerberg’s reason for Facebook’s creation. Is it an American style individualism celebration giving power to individual users over their own social elites? Or merely a proliferated offspring of a class based historic university? Whatever the reason, Sorkin's screenplay leaves this ambiguous in so doing leaving us in disarray as to what truly defines this moment of history.
Though Sorkin’s script is already a modern masterpiece, for decades to come Fincher’s direction will be seen as tragically snubbed by the academy. Opening in a brownstone Harvard palette of elitism, later moving to the sunny excess colours and the dark seedy nightspots of Sean Parker’s Palo Alto, the film is masterfully moody. Trent Reznor’s score in particular adds a horror dimension to Facebook’s creation chronicle with pulsating electronica and occasional shrieking atonal violins. It might hold the clue to the film’s secret identity that’s it’s a really a monster movie about its subject of a social revolution began by social ineptness. It’s a wonderful irony that will see Zuckerberg amongst screen legends Charles Foster Kane and Jake La Motta as well as the worst Oscar snub since the films of these figures.
If one target of Fincher’s is the socially underdeveloped nerds who run the world now, another is that of the elitist society which bores vengeful geeks like Zuckerberg. The hilarious Harvard elite Winklevoss twins(both played by Armie Hammer) offer consistent comic relief as a well as an expose of a supposedly classless American society. Accusing Zuckerberg of ‘intellectual property theft’ after he alters their idea into his own Facebook, their numerous political wrangling are comic highlights of the film. From their already immortal line “I’m 6, 5, 220 and there’s two of me” to their manner of trying to politely accost Zuckerberg through the 'gentleman' politics of Harvard law , it’s observational as well as hilarious. On the other end of the spectrum for Zuckerberg, is the freewheeling Napster founder Sean Parker(played with energetic ease by Justin Timberlake) who best appeals to Zuckerberg’s ideology. In one scene, Parker seduces Zuckerberg over shots in a nightclub to encourage user growth and delay advertisers as its “uncool”. Zuckerberg’s idolatry of Parker’s social ease and pseudo rapport with face book users is all that comes close to revealing Zuckerberg’s reason for Facebook’s creation. Is it an American style individualism celebration giving power to individual users over their own social elites? Or merely a proliferated offspring of a class based historic university? Whatever the reason, Sorkin's screenplay leaves this ambiguous in so doing leaving us in disarray as to what truly defines this moment of history.
Though Sorkin’s script is already a modern masterpiece, for decades to come Fincher’s direction will be seen as tragically snubbed by the academy. Opening in a brownstone Harvard palette of elitism, later moving to the sunny excess colours and the dark seedy nightspots of Sean Parker’s Palo Alto, the film is masterfully moody. Trent Reznor’s score in particular adds a horror dimension to Facebook’s creation chronicle with pulsating electronica and occasional shrieking atonal violins. It might hold the clue to the film’s secret identity that’s it’s a really a monster movie about its subject of a social revolution began by social ineptness. It’s a wonderful irony that will see Zuckerberg amongst screen legends Charles Foster Kane and Jake La Motta as well as the worst Oscar snub since the films of these figures.
Wednesday 2 March 2011
Following redux review
In July 2010, Christopher Nolan claimed $170 million necessary to depict dreams on the largest scale. Back in 1998, however, he only needed $6000 to create a unique nightmare. Following, a film noir thriller set in 1998 concerns young unemployed writer Bill. He becomes embroiled in a dangerous game after following individuals in the streets of London for inspiration for his novel. Involved in burglary after being caught by the suave Cobb, he eventually becomes romantically involved with one of his robbery subjects. Nobody is what they seem and the film’s plot is that of a traditional hardboiled noir. Despite gaining critical acclaim and some awards recognition, the film did not gain Nolan a wide publicity. Yet now with his current Hollywood status, Following may accumulate the wider audience it deserves.
Yet to compare it only with his elaborate Hollywood productions would be unfair. Nolan invests Following with a simple economical filmmaking style. Lacking in dissolves or fades and using a plethora of close up and tracking shots, it’s a bare bones style for an essentially simple theme. As writer Bill becomes deeply involved with dapper burglar Cobb, it evolves into a distinct British tale of the smart businessman London ensnaring the exploited working class. The choice of cold, realistic black and white to reflect this dynamic is a clever one but Nolan allows some unhinged techniques to creep in. The early scenes of the actual ‘following’ in which Bill stalks subjects for writing ‘inspiration’ is shot in an unstable, shaky POV style. Varying with mostly simple techniques, Nolan injects some verve into the action - a technique reused later for Insomnia (2002).
Yet to compare it only with his elaborate Hollywood productions would be unfair. Nolan invests Following with a simple economical filmmaking style. Lacking in dissolves or fades and using a plethora of close up and tracking shots, it’s a bare bones style for an essentially simple theme. As writer Bill becomes deeply involved with dapper burglar Cobb, it evolves into a distinct British tale of the smart businessman London ensnaring the exploited working class. The choice of cold, realistic black and white to reflect this dynamic is a clever one but Nolan allows some unhinged techniques to creep in. The early scenes of the actual ‘following’ in which Bill stalks subjects for writing ‘inspiration’ is shot in an unstable, shaky POV style. Varying with mostly simple techniques, Nolan injects some verve into the action - a technique reused later for Insomnia (2002).
The acting of the two leads is impeccable. Recalling Leonard Shelby in Memento and Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins, Bill is shown to be a man in search of a purpose. His early following and involvement in burglary are like the later character’s individual moral crusades - mere exercises to give purpose to empty lives. Yet neither Guy Pearce nor Christian Bale possessed the pathetic quality that Jeremy Theobald as Cobb conveys here. With a scruffy beard and raspy voice, he effortlessly convinces as someone in this lifestyle. A voiceover adds a consummate creepiness to his character; yet it’s hard not to feel pity in some of his more desperate scenes. His performance is overshadowed by that of Alex Haw as manipulative Cobb. Businessman like and all knowing, Cobb nevertheless has a philosophy which disguises his self interested intentions. Stealing and analysing burglary victims’ possessions, he claims; “you take it away.... to show them what they had.” Masquerading as a philosopher and moral superior, he is really nothing more than an opportunistic, underhanded thief. But Haw highlights his most darkly comic and charming aspects- a plausible idol for the socially outcast Bill.
Their relationship paints the ultimate theme of the film. The key to what unravels an individual is in their inner lives and personality hence why Cobb steals small compromising objects from his burglaries. Bill reveals information about himself and who he is in his first meeting with Cobb whereas Cobb remains hidden and secretive. Individual emotion, honesty and lost artists like Bill have no place in Cobb’s role of control, foresight and cool professionalism.
The film isn’t perfect despite its successes. The tone veers into Guy Ritchie territory when a tea towel is asked for in cleaning up a murder. The non-chronological plot of flash forwards and flashbacks felt startling at its release but now feels less refined. Such a contrived structure, incorporated to simply confuse and disorientate, is disappointing after the form is meaning style of Memento. It’s the major problem which permeates this and so many of Nolan’s films. It’s hard not to feel like chess pieces in Nolan’s game and not feel manipulated by the plot structure and uncertainty of character motivations. Whilst we never feel cheated as an audience, Following feels at times more like an intellectual exercise than a fully fledged first feature. Though considering Nolan’s miniscule budget, the film is a rare achievement. By the astonishing twist ending, one can only wish a break from big budgets as one of his best works was made quietly.
Following Review by Tom Cobb
Monday 21 February 2011
The Social Network review
In 1987 Oliver Stone produced a film that encapsulated a whole era and captured the Zeitgeist perfectly, the character of Gordon Gekko crystallising the most prevalent of the seven deadly sins of the time. In 2010 Stone is set on repeating this trick by attempting to pull off one of the hardest tasks in the film industry; the sequel that matches up to its predecessor. The timing seems perfect, with the current financial crisis reflecting the true bust of the late eighties boom and the impending release of the original film’s central character in real time. However, his film has been eclipsed by The Social Network. As the seventies had All The President’s Men, the eighties had Stone’s aforementioned Wall Street, the nineties had The Insider and now, after a decade without a major time capsule of a film, the new millennium has The Social Network.
With The Social Network slamming Wall Street 2 at the box office it seems that while Stone has been missing the mark with presidential bio-pics and fumbling around South America stroking the egos of Bolivarian political leaders his position, that he earned cutting his teeth (or should that be grinding his teeth) working on Scarface, as the major socio-political-commentator-director has been usurped by a younger model in the form of David Fincher. Presenting the skills he has crafted and honed since his 1995 breakthrough picture Se7en, Fincher is backed by a killer script from The West Wing’s Aaron Sorkin. It is testament to Sorkin’s ability that he managed to pull it off. The facebook story is RAM full of absolutely un-writable characters. After all, if you were to conjure a pair of opponents for Zuckerberg upon the battlefield of intellectual property, would you have chosen identical twin Olympic rowers christened with the inimitable moniker of Winklevoss? I wouldn’t imagine so. But, it is in characters such as these that some of the wittiest of dialogue comes; as one of the twins negates the need to hire someone for the job of intimidating facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg: “I’m 6’4, weigh 220 pounds and there’s two of me.”
Fincher has also assembled a great cast. A handful of the best young actors in America appear in this movie. Jesse Eisenberg’s portrayal of the character is so deft and on point that we are treated to a mesmerising display that excels past even the usual high standard of performance Fincher manages to extract from his casts. He is ever unlikable, ever untrustworthy and ever petty, but does manage a small amount of sympathy in being that guy (we all know one), that brilliant, borderline genius without a clue. If Zuckerberg is truly anything like Eisenberg’s version, then an argument for Asperger syndrome stands on firm footing. Andrew Garfield continues to impress, slightly twisting and improving his character and performance adeptly from the film Lions For Lambs earlier in the decade playing original facebook CFO Eduardo Saverin, I doubt, however, that the script, or demand on his acting ability, will match up to this role in the upcoming Spiderman movies. Despite these two lead characters portrayed so excellently, it is Justin Timberlake who shines as Napster founder Sean Parker. In a pivotal scene Parker sums up the ideology of today’s intelligent and irreverent youth echoing Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko giving the “greed is good” speech in 1987 verbally wrapping up the 80s yuppie mentality. I can smell the outside bet for Best Supporting Actor at next year’s Oscars now. And I’m sure this will pick up a whole load of nominations elsewhere, and maybe some statuettes. Lord knows it deserves every accolade it receives. *****
The Social Network review ... by Matt Henshaw
MattHenshaw.com
The Social Network review ... by Matt Henshaw
MattHenshaw.com
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