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Reviews
The Railway Man (2013)
An unexpectedly joyful experience
What a turn from Colin Firth as Eric Lomax. He was the most impressive thing about this film. Not that the rest of it was at all bad. In fact it made for an endearing and inspiring evening, saved from any false sentimentality by its basis in fact. While the plot was depicted in a slightly disjointed way, making sure the reconciliation of the material was left right until the end, it held together.
Firth seemed more impressive here than in his Oscar winning performance in The Kings Speech, but that could be because there was more space for dramatic fireworks. Nicole Kidman as his wife was nicely understated and very likable. One of the joys of the film was that all the characters were portrayed with a great sense of human warmth about them. Lomax's obsession with trains is painted with endearing care and ties everything together when the times and settings jump about all over the place. Although it depicts horrors, which are indeed uncomfortable to watch, the film also keeps your faith in humanity, which is not always the case.
In short, The Railway Man is perfect to settle down to on a cold, wet night when things are feeling a little bleak and, no matter how awful things may be, this film could make a convincing case for a bit of renewed faith in the world.
Lost in Translation (2003)
Lends ordinary life a bit of poetry
I'd been warned about Lost in Translation. It is a fairly uneventful, and quite often direction-less film, with a script made up of ordinary utterances, sometimes barely audible, and situations which are vaguely amusing without being laugh-out-loud funny.
The actors are not called on to do anything overtly emotional or melodramatic. Instead they put in solid performances playing ordinary people displaying rather good comic timing.
Watching this film feels like floating along aimlessly for a while inside someone else's head. Each scene is interesting and fun to observe while not adding up to much on their own. Put together however they become something more than the sum of their parts.
The understatement of the final sequence is more moving than could ever be expected. It builds to it, as a summary rather than a climax, and leaves you charmed and hopeful and satisfied. Even the music seems to transform from shapeless sound to melodious song, finally making life-affirming sense of the cityscape so wonderfully depicted in the cinematography.
Lots of people love walking through a city with their headphones on. Perhaps it lends ordinary life a bit of poetry? Watching this film gives the same feeling. Enjoy!
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988)
A triumph
This film has all the makings of a family classic while still being typically Gilliamesque and deserves to be better known. The story is a swashbuckling adventure tale led by the enigmatic Baron Munchausen, although the sympathy for the viewer comes in the shape of a little girl called Sally. She could almost be described as the voice of the Baron's conscious; keeping him on his mission despite the various distractions they encounter. One particular distraction comes in the form of Uma Thurman as Venus and Oliver Reed as her husband in a wonderfully crafted sequence embracing both romance and comedy.
Being a typically over the top production from the director, there is plenty of hammy acting on show here but coupled with a wonderful sense of fun. John Neville deserves many congratulations for managing to tread the line between eccentricity and charm as the Baron (how a character with that big a nose can be charming I have no idea but it works - really). Every member of the cast, however, does great work, making the time you spend with the characters a real joy.
The great thing about Terry Gilliam's films is their level of detail in plot, set, costumes and special effect. This film is no exception; everything is perfect in this department.
Another notable point is the soundtrack. I don't know who composed the music but it really is wonderful. The only negative point is its very liberal use, especially towards the end. It almost sounds like there is a struggle going on in the final climatic sequences between the action and the soundtrack, which is intent on hammering out a symphony at the same time. The music is just too good to stay in the background! For a sentimentalist like me the most disappointing thing about Gilliam's other films has been their lack of an ending - ambiguity rules. Baron Munchausen, however, bucks the trend and is beautifully triumphant. Unlike Brazil, which represents the triumph of a society over the individual, this film is the exact reverse; a celebration of eccentricity over conformity.
I would heartily recommend it to anyone, as light-hearted family fodder but also as a film with enough depth to withstand being watched over and over again.
Casino Royale (1967)
Caution: Not to be taken seriously
It's very odd that all the reasons which people are giving as to why they hate this film are all the reasons why I like it so much. So it's confused. Understatement of the century. There's no clear plot. Well no, that's true. Even the jokes aren't, for the most part, particularly funny. All of these things put together would make for a pretty atrocious film.
A cautiously bad film, however, wins no admirers; one which throws caution out of the window and embraces total confusion at least achieves memorability. Casino Royale redeems itself like this, through the sheer scale of its awfulness. Chaos reigns; the stellar cast are left spouting meaningless drivel. The psychedelic sets and hopelessly incomprehensible situations conspire to render the whole film groundless. Very fitting, I think, considering it was made in the 1960s.
It is possible for every wrong to make a right. Far from trying in vain to ground the film a little better, I'd like to give the film makers (the many that there were) a little more credit and think that they knew exactly what they were creating: a gloriously OTT and surreal piece of cinema. The key is to not take it seriously, otherwise you'll hate it. I consider it a wonderful guilty pleasure but then I am a sucker for 1960s star-filled, epic comedies.
Outbreak (1995)
With a cast like that it should be decent...
...and it is. It's nothing earth shattering, but as enjoyable as you need for an evening in. The plot was predictable (this is disaster thriller territory): a deadly virus, that kills within hours, has somehow made its way from Zaire to the US and there is a race against time to stop it. Generally I thought the plot twists were plausible, although I'm sure some could disagree. The script seemed pretty good to me. Maybe that was partly down to the quality of cast brought in to say it.
Dustin Hoffman, as always, did a good job although covering ground more typical of Pacino. I also thought Kevin Spacey was also worth a mention but the ensemble as a whole worked well.
The direction was also successful with a good mix of suspense and emotion. I did think at the start, however, that the cinematography looked a little dated and the music sounded like it was written 10 years earlier. Although the overarching plot seemed facile there were some rather surprising action scenes involving military helicopters and bombs which I found quite absorbing.
Overall a solid thriller made work by the successful acting and character formation.
Mesmer (1994)
Odd...very odd
'Mesmer' is an odd movie. On the face of it you'd think it would work quite well – beautiful period setting, interesting character, a score by Michael Nyman and Rickman, who makes a very charismatic lead. Unfortunately it went a bit wrong somewhere down the line and, as others have pointed out, it is quite hard to define where.
For me the two main players of the cast did a great job. Rickman presented Mesmer as charming but complex; Ooms brought plenty of emotion to her role as the blind pianist. Beyond this, however, there seemed little character development not helped by the relatively short runtime.
The plot just seemed...well...dull. There was very little feeling of direction and most of the scenes were very static affairs. There also seemed to be lots of duplication of material as Mesmer treated numerous people in, what looked like, very similar ways. Occasional slapstick moments, one in particular involving a certain throat complaint coming at the end of one of the most absorbing scenes in the movie, somewhat destroyed the tone. Another was a brief appearance of a very caricatured Marie Antoinette. Both seemed rather out of place and had the effect of pushing the extraordinary events of the story into absurdity.
Watch this film for the cast alone. As for the plot: if you know a little about Mesmer before watching you may find it more absorbing but for a novice like me there seemed very little substance beneath that beautiful period setting.
Der Name der Rose (1986)
A chilling portrayal of monastic life
Having not read the novel I cannot comment on whether this is a worthy adaptation or not but it definitely made for an absorbing and melodramatic movie.
The plot, with plenty of red herrings and suspicious looking characters, could have benefited from more explanation but as it stands is explicable enough. By the end I almost wanted a Poirot-style flashback montage although this, admittedly, would have destroyed the air of mystery that hung around the whole film. Even in the final shots mist still filled the air...
The cinematography was excellent successfully creating a chilling atmosphere full of suspicion and dread. There were also a few graphic scenes that made the picture of medieval life seem realistic, but increasingly grim especially with the arrival of the inquisition.
The cast all acquit themselves well with Abraham in particular making the most of the lines given to him. I didn't expect to like Connery, being such a well known face, but he played his part well.
The fast pace of this movie inevitably means some attention to detail, in terms of plot and character development, is lost but the result is a gripping and melodramatic thriller which provokes both disgust at the hypocrisy of monastic life and sympathy for its chief characters.