julesfdelorme Reviews

Damsel (2024)

Pretty pretty good. Not great. But not awful either

[6/10 · 8 May 2024]

There are those actors who I've never caught out in anything that wasn't very good. Despite her young age Millie Bobby Brown was shaping up to be one of those actors. Granted, I've only seen Stranger Things and the two Enola Holmes movies, but I like them both a lot, and I like her a lot in them. Damsel is not a bad movie. Not exactly. It has a wonderful cast including the divine Robin Wright, one of my favourite British character actors, Ray Winstone, and Angela Bassett, though the latter is given absolutely nothing to use her considerable talents on. And Millie Bobby Brown, up until now, has been that rare combination of a very good and very likable actor. But a very good cast cannot save a script that has nothing new to say or to show us, a dragon that never feels real and whose voice and dialogue verges on just plain silly. And Millie Bobby Brown herself, and maybe this is just me, but I think it isn't, seems to be putting on an accent despite being British. All of that makes it sound like Damsel is an awful movie. But it's not. It's good. But it's just good. And it has all the elements and the cast to have been a better than just good movie. And the presence of Robin Wright and Ray Winstone, who seldom make anything but very good or great things, and of Millie Bobby Brown herself suggests it started out to be something better than it turned out to be. Maybe they polished down the script until it was too generic, until it had no edges or quirks. Or maybe the direction went for glibness and hallmarks rather than texture and uniqueness. It just feels like Damsel wanted to be a much better movie than it turned out to be. As a star vehicle, which it was obviously meant to be, Millie Bobby Brown is just not given any moment to exercise her considerable charm. We don't see that almost goofy laugh or that smile. And maybe she herself wanted to try something more serious. But it's a mistake. Because we don't end up caring about or liking her character deeply the way we did in other roles. And similar things can be said for the other superb actors in this cast. We see little of Robin Wright's range or her command of subtlety. Ray Winstone has some moments, but they are few and the film definitely does not make use of this this actor's presence. All these actors are cast as types. Not characters. And the same can be said of Millie Bobby Brown in the lead. And again I'm making Damsel sound like a terrible move. It's not a terrible move. Many people will quite like it I'm sure. And then they'll go on to forget it. Who knows. Maybe the actors did give better performances and it all ended up on a cutting room floor. Well, they don't do that anymore. But you get my drift. Maybe some editor, the director, or some producer just took it and made it as generic as inoffensive and as safe as possible, and in doing so, cut the soul right out of this film. Or maybe they just made and settled for a good enough but not great movie. I don't know which would be worse. That they made this sort of good film on purpose. Or that something or someone happened to make Damsel less than the film it wanted to be. I'd give it a 6 out 10. I think there are enough good elements to raise it above 5. So, you decide.... If you're a Millie Bobby Brown fan, you'll probably still be one, just a little bit less of one, after watching Damsel. Or, if you want to remain a big fan... Maybe give Damsel a miss. At least for now...

Clean (IV) (2021)

Far Better Than Just an Action Movie

[10/10 · 11 April 2024]

Every once in a while a movie sneaks up on you that is not just good, that is great. And you wonder why you haven't heard of it. Every once in a while you forget how good an actor is and you see them do something and you think to yourself: Oh yeah, why did I forget how superb an actor this person is. Both of those things happened for me with Clean. I had forgotten just how great an actor Adrien Brody is. I had forgotten how good an actor that Adrien Brody can be. And his tone perfect quietly intense and mournful performance in Clean reminded me that he is among the best actors working in the industry. And maybe it's because he co-wrote the screenplay with director Paul Solet, but the performance and the film fit each other perfectly. Clean has all the elements of an action film, and they would have made far more money, and more of a splash had they made it just another action film, but it never stoops, it never is not true to its quietly intense and mournful essence. Which makes it far more, and far better than a mere action film. Clean is the story of a garbageman with a past. A dark and violent past. Yes, that's the beginning of almost any action film. Well, except perhaps for the garbageman part. But Clean takes place in the ghetto, and it's world is grimy and quietly hopeless. Not the shiny, flashy stuff of action films. Even those set in ghettos manage somehow to be bright and colourful. Not Clean. Clean is the only name we're ever given for Brody's character, and, like many things in this film, the details are left in the shadows. Perhaps he is called Clean because he's a garbageman. Perhaps he has been called Clean for a long time and for other, far darker reasons. The fact that the film is called Clean is deeply ironic, because nothing in or of its world is not dirty, is not grimy and worn out. The character Clean is trying to live a quiet life of relative solitude. I know. That too is an action movie cliche. And, like in every action movie, we know that Clean will inevitably be forced to go back to his violent ways. But the villain of the film, played by character actor Glenn Fleshler, while he is on one hand a typical crime boss, is also deftly and subtly written and played by Fleshler to have depth, little fine glimpses of humanity, of character. And that makes the inevitable clash far more interesting than you find in most action films. And his son, played by Richie Merritt, who some may know from the wonderful film White Boy Rick, while at once the cliche mob boss's son who hates his father, has a humanity to him even in what little we do see of him (In more ways than one...), that belies the simple role he is seen to play. And so, while we know what's coming of course, Clean does it in such a way that is interesting, tragic and anything but the usual. Clean decides to be a great, if difficult, in that it is less noisy and less entertaining in the way we have been conditioned to expect, film rather than a money making easy to watch action movie. Even the action when it comes is brutal in its realism, and, while it is action, is less exciting than it is unpleasant to watch. Many critics would refer to Clean as a small film, since it is not flashy and nothing about it seems big budget, or what Hollywood in completely oblivious perverseness refers to as High Concept, meaning aiming to bring in big box office. Clean is no small film. It just aims to be better than a so called big film. And Clean, no doubt, will garner bad reviews, since it is very much not what you expect it to be. Clean is better than you expect it to be. Clean was better than I expected to be. That doesn't happen nearly often enough. Which is more than good reason to give Clean a chance to sneak up and surprise you too.

The Victim (2019)

A Superbly Polished Gem

[10/10 · 5 February 2024]

Victim is one of those very British, well, in this case Scottish, TV series where you might get three or four episodes and that's it. No second season. No follow up movie. And, as in in a lot of those series, and this is most true of Victim, the few episodes are the exact amount of episodes it takes to craft a perfect jewel. Victim is so good, so great, that of course you want more, but the final episode, the final moments, are absolutely perfect. And to add to that would be to mar perfection. Those who have seen Victim know that I do not overstate the case. Victim starts out very good and it builds and it builds and it continues to build until that final episode until that final moment where the greatness of true and honest depth has been earned and the acting and the writing and the directing come together flawlessly to lead us to something truly astonishing. Victim is one one of the British, Scottish works that is not interested in bringing us car chases or romances or cheap thrills. Victim never stoops. Not ever a little bit. It assumes that its audience is intelligent enough and adult enough to follow along without being pandered to or prodded. Not that Victim is intellectually challenging to watch, even though it is intricate and extremely smart. And not that Victim is any where near boring or that it does not draw you in. I never binge watch shows. And I was compelled to binge watch Victim. It is an emotionally challenging show. In fact I would place the strongest Trigger Warnings for those who have lost love ones or have experienced violence or abuse. Not only does Victim deal with those subjects. It nails them. As someone who has experienced all of those things I can tell you that Victim at times is so very true and so very right that it shattered me at those moments to watch it. But it also filled me with the elation that one feels when one recognized those truths being expressed in a way that they can be felt deeply and known. And not just understood on an intellectual or rational level, but felt deeply. This is what art is supposed to do and so rarely does do. And Victim does this in such a way that makes it all beautiful without ever backing down from the tragic and horrifying truth of it all. Something only great art is able to accomplish. Rembrandt at his best, Caravaggio and of course Van Gogh. As far as Television goes I would place, and this is no small thing for me at all, Victim alongside the magnificent series Rectify, for it haunting beauty and deep soul. I have eluded to this already, but the acting is absolutely superb, led by the always flawlessly true, the unfailingly and unerringly deep Kelly Macdonald. The writing largely by creator Rob Williams is rife with dialogue that snaps your head back with its fierce truth and the beautiful rhythm of the language. And the directing is tenaciously sparse, with no wasted scenes or images to put slack in the tension. And it is the tension that will draw you in. You are pulled, you are driven from one moment to the next, from one scene the next until you arrive at the explosive conclusion. Victim is a perfect polished gem of a movie and those who experience it will know how special Victim is. Those who do not... Well. You'll survive just fine. But you' have missed out on something truly unique, some thing very special. And something truly and absolutely extraordinary. Victim, to my mind is so good, that any life will be made a little better for having watched it. And what more, what better thing could you say about a movie, about anything than that.

Nobody (I) (2021)

Not like every other action film

[9/10 · 27 September 2023]

You would think that the last thing that would cross your mind if you were making an action movie is "Let's get Bob Odenkirk.". Don't get me wrong. I love Bob Odenkirk. I happen to think that Better Call Saul is superior series to Breaking Bad for a lot of reasons, but in large part because Bob Odenkirk is a far more interesting, likable and complex actor to carry the lead. And Better Call Saul and Break Bad are crime dramas, with some comedy thrown in. But Bob Odenkirk as an action hero? Bob Odenkirk looks like the kind of guy your Aunt could beat up without messing up her good Sunday dress. Okay, most of my Aunts, my sister and my mother could beat me up and I was a professional fighter, but you get my point. I know, I know, some of you are thinking they probably said the same thing about Bruce Willis before he did Die Hard. But Bruce Willis at least looked like he might be tough. Bob Odenkirk doesn't look look like there's even the slightest chance that he might be tough. That, it turns out, is what makes Nobody work. That, it turns out, is what makes Nobody unlike all the action movies that you've ever seen. I don't even particularly like action movies. Too formulaic for me. But I've somehow seen a lot of them because there are so many of them out there. And, let's face it, they're all pretty much the same. There's only, what, three or four basic storylines and they're all variations on them. There's vengeance. There's guy or gal who was a very bad person gets drawn in again. Save the whatever, the world or your family or a child, something like that. Group is drawn together, maybe again, maybe not, for a very special mission. That pretty covers it, doesn't it? And Nobody is one of those four, and it has the standard action lines like "Don't call 9-11" or "You brought a lot of shotguns." "You brought a lot of Russians.", because Russians are the standard safe bad guy that isn't likely to offend anybody. (Though occasionally they might go for the big stretch and make them Albanians or Bulgarians or some other Eastern Block country so long as it isn't Muslim, because that's become too controversial.). But there is something about Bob Odenkirk, some deep down shifting sense of unhappiness that he seems to carry so well, that makes him unlike any action hero that I can remember seeing, and that you want to be on his side. And the action scenes are orchestrated in such a way, that while some drift into the standard we've seen this before stuff, many involve his cleverness and imagination with violence rather than a real physical proficiency. Though he is physically proficient his edge is seen to be his mind, his ability to improvise the action as he goes. Oh, and there's the bonus of Chistopher Lloyd as his father. I don't want to give anything away, but I don't think I've seen Christpher Lloyd have this much fun in a role in a very long time. A very long time. Connie Nielsen, as the wife, is underused, even wasted. But then again she is almost always underused and wasted. On its own I think Nobody would be a fun though fairly standard action flic. With Bob Odenkirk in the lead, and with Christopher Lloyd being allowed to have his fun, Nobody is much better than your average action movie. In fact I hope in might be the future of some action movies. Instead of casting those muscular handsome guys try looking for somebody more unlikely. I mean, you're not going to find many Bob Odenkirks. But look at what happens when you do go looking for one. You get a movie that even people who hate action movies will probably like. A lot.

Pearl (2022)

You have to see this movie!

[10/10 · 11 September 2023]

I'm a little late to the Ti West fan club. I did see and love X. But then I forgot and moved on. Until I noticed that Pearl, the prequel to X, was available to me on Amazon Prime. I remembered how much I loved X, and how rare a really good and therefore precious a really good horror movie is. It's a genre that tends to suffer from its popularity and therefore, whether it be in a movie, series or book, subject to lazy cliches by those who only seek to make money easily. A good many try to lean in to those cliches as a form of tribute, but almost always end up making something that is weak and diluted. What I so loved about X is that Ti West does lean into the cliches but still manages to make something that feels original and fresh. Pearl is very different than X. There is still the use of horror movie genre staples in a way that is clever and playful. But it goes back to a very different era than X, which makes its home in the 70s horror genre. Pearl goes back to a much earlier era and at first seems to suffer in the is far less moody and intense and far more tongue in cheek. But then Mia Goth, who co-wrote this script, really starts to let loose and, let me tell you, this woman can Act. All the hackneyed phrases about great performances would be apropos here. This performance takes over the film and becomes what drives it and I found myself just enjoying watching Goth take what could and should easily be over the edge, far over the edge, but somehow never is. This is one of those performances that you would have expected from Malkovich or Gary Oldman or even Judi Dench. Yes, it is that great. There is more reason to watch the film. West is a master of using camera angles and creating moments that from a lesser director would be overdone but in West's hands reminds you of Hitchcock or David Fincher at his very best. Without Goth's performance it would still be a great film. But with Goth's bravura performance it becomes a film that deserves rewatching, that makes you want to stand up and applaud. The final shot, I don't want to give anything away so I won't go into detail, is a masterpiece of acting and of directing. Pearl is not as frightening as X. At times, that final shot for instance, you'll want to and you should laugh. But then you may want to go back to admire the sheer impossibility of the acting that Goth somehow pulls off, and the artistry of the directing. I cannot say enough about Goth's performance. You'll have to see it to believe it. It is a high wire act with absolutely no net. If you love acting, if you love great performances, then you absolutely have to see Pearl. If you love horror movies then you absolutely have to see Pearl. It will definitely, and it should, end up on most greatest ever lists. I hesitate to say that it is better than X. It is very different than X. And yet they have so much in common. I am late to jump on the Ti West bandwagon. I am late to jump on the Mia Goth bandwagon. But, after Pearl, I am firmly a gigantic fan of both. I don't don't know how you can watch Pearl and not be stunned by it, and not absolutely love it. To say it is a great film feels too small a tribute to what Pearl is. There are so few great horror movies. Pearl, along with X, is more an achievement, in that it masters a genre that is so rarely served even slightly well.

Rectify (2013–2016)

The greatest television series that I've ever seen.

[10/10 · 12 April 2023]

Rectify I have been asked, and I often, perhaps more often, ask myself, what is the greatest television series that I have ever seen? The best comedy series for me is definitely The Misfits. This strange and quirky British series overcomes it's low budget very early on to be so consistently hilarious and weird that nothing else even comes close. As far as drama goes there are a number of truly great contenders. Deadwood tops the list. But through no fault of the show makers it never got to bring itself to a satisfactory conclusion and the movie, made years later just lacked the edge, many of the actors just seemed to have trouble falling back into the rhythm of David Milch's unique rhythmic dialogue. And so, great as it is, it is not quite the best that I've seen. Another of Milch's creations, NYPD Blue, is definitely the greatest of the old television dramas. But the removal of Milch towards the end, through no fault of the producers, Milch once again falling into the deep dark hole of his addictions, leaves the series flawed, though most of it, particularly the Jimmy Smits episodes, still the best the network television ever saw. The Sopranos definitely belongs up there. But take away James Gandolfini and you have a great show but not one of the greatest shows. It was really his performance that raised its level to something truly special, and, for me, while that still makes it one of the greatest shows, that eliminates it from being the very best show that I've ever seen. The very best show would be the result of superb writing, directing and an entire cast coming together to make something truly special. Many might disagree with me on that. Hell on Wheels, a show that many people have probably missed, comes very close. But it goes on too long and becomes repetitive in the last few seasons. Though I'd still say the Swede is one of the best villains that I've ever seen in television or movies. You never forget his almost sweet yet pathological sorrow each time he committs the most evil acts. Kingdom, another series many people missed out on, largely because it was based around Mixed Martial Arts comes the most close of all the contenders. It is fun to watch, it is compellingly dramatic, and it's ending is pitch perfect. Jonathan Tucker is the standout in this series. I don't know why he's not a star. I don't know why I'm still seeing him in bit parts in other shows. And if you watch Kingdom, which you definitely should, you will be just a bothered by this question as I am. Kingdom should be the best series I've ever seen. And it would be, were it not for Rectify, which most of you have almost definitely not seen, and which I have now watched twice. Rectify was created by, and is mostly written by Ray McKinnon, who is the actor who so beautifully played the Preacher in Deadwood, and who you'll know as an actor from so many other things such as Sons of Anarchy. He's a terrific actor. And somehow he's an even better writer. And his brother, Bruce McKinnon, plays the step-father in Rectify and does it beautifully. What the hell were those kids fed for breakfast?! The cast is lead by Canadian/Australian actor Aden Young (I put Canadian first, because it makes me proud as a fellow Canadian to be able to lay what little claim we have on him...) who sets the haunting, haunted tone of a series that will leave you both haunted and aghast at it's somber beauty. It is a flawless series. The entire cast, the writer, everything about this show is like Faulkner, Thomas Wolfe or Cormac McCarthy 's best novels. The series is set in the Southern U. S. and, as with those writers, the South is very much a character here. The story is of a man, Daniel, played by Young, released from prison after years on death row because of DNA evidence. But the DNA voids the trial the found him guilty. There is still his confession. And he himself does not know if he committed the murder/rape of which he is accused of. He was under the influence of psychedelic drugs and is not sure what exactly happened. So he returns home to a town where many think he is still guilty and where the legal authorities are still out to make a case against him. And we the audience are also left unsure. Both Mckinnon, the writer, and the cast, do a masterful job in presenting us with fully dimensional human beings. Even those who are against Daniel, or who are not necessarily for him, are shown in all their humanity. Though we see the world mostly through Daniel's eyes we are not sure how to feel ourselves except that something truly tragic took place and something truly tragic, this man living a life for years on death row, where he learned not to expect tomorrows, followed that. We see mostly through Daniel's eyes, develop a relationship with another inmate through the walls of death row and in a beautifully tragic way the ways that relationship has stayed with him in the present. This is still a man who doesn't know how to live in the world. This is still a man who doesn't know how to be alive. As I've said, I've now watched Rectify twice. It never hits a false note. And unlike so many shows, it's ending is unfailingly true to the rest of the show. Rectify is in short, a masterpiece. That phrase gets overused. But here is the one place it applies. You should definitely watch all those other shows that I've mentioned if you haven't already. But you should seek out and watch Rectify if you want to see true art. You can find many shows that will entertain you. But will find only a few shows that move something deep within you. And Rectify, above all others, will do that and do that in the most profound way. That for me is what makes in the greatest drama series that I've ever seen.

Mammals (2022)

More than worth the watch

[10/10 · 4 April 2023]

Mammals is listed as a comedy. And there are some laughs. In fact there are some fall over in your chair tears in your eyes laughs. But Mammals might be the most mournful comedy that I've ever seen. But you should watch it. You should definitely watch it. Mammals is wonderfully original and evocative and it is a show that will stay with you long after watch it. It is smart and it is charming despite having an overwhelmingly sad patina to it. Many of the best British comedies are like this. But Mammals has a charm that is all its own. I only knew of James Corden as the talk show host who was always doing musical bits with his guest before watching this show. It turns out he's a wonderful actor who can be funny but also is capable of serious pathos. Maybe having never watched his talk show freed me from the expectation of his just being funny. I don't know. The show is extremely well written and very clever with recurring background themes, such as the 1960's popstar who appears at the beginning and whose image keeps reappearing in the backgrounds, or the use of the idea of Mammal, which is used in various ways for different characters right up until the very end. There are some things that I'd argue with: The big reveal at the end, in fact both of the big reveals at the end, seem to go against the established character and do not seem earned or fleshed out. Normally that would be a big issue for me. I hate unearned twists. But the show, the writing and the acting is so well done that I found myself, despite myself, inclined to just let that slide. Maybe I've gotten soft. Or maybe the show just drew me along so completely that it earned the final cheats. I'm inclined to think it was the latter. So I'm telling you that you should watch a show that is ostensibly a comedy that really isn't a comedy that cheats its twists at the end and is going to leave you feeling terribly sad. Except that you don't feel sad at the end. Well, you do. In fact you will mourn for these characters. But you will also feel a kind of satisfaction. Perhaps the satisfaction one feels at looking at a troubled painting or listening to a really good sad piece of music. Or, more accurately, the satisfaction one feels at watching a Buster Keaton or a Jackie Gleason at work. You do laugh. You will laugh. But your laughter is tinged with the knowledge that you are witnessing a kind of comic tragedy, perhaps the highest form of comedy there is. Anybody can make you laugh by playing the fool. Only a select few can do what Robin Williams once described watching Richard Pryor was like: "You want to laugh and cry at exactly the same time.". Mammals is that kind of experience. Maybe not everyone wants that. Maybe most people like pratfalls and banana peels. This in not a show for them. In fact I would advise them to run away from this show. But if you are ready for the charm that carries heartache and grief at exactly the same time as laughter then Mammals is a show for you. If you're tired of the same old sitcoms, even the great British ones, and you're ready for something deeper and more emotionally challenging then Mammals is for you. You may even agree with me that the twists at the end are forced. But I think that you'll also agree with me that the rest of the show, the bulk of the show, is more than worth the watch.

Promising Young Woman (2020)

Devastatingly poignant

[10/10 · 17 March 2023]

Carey Mulligan is one of those rare actors who is not just at the very top of her craft but has, at least so far, shown the ability to be in nothing but the very best and most thoughtful works. A Promising Young Woman is one of the best of these works. For some reason Netflix has it billed as a comedy. There is some funny dialogue and some of the acts are darkly comic, but this is anything but a comedy. A Promising Young Woman is a devastatingly poignant skewering if the way that society reserves its outrage for those situations where the wrongdoing is black and white, where there is an obvious villain and victim. A victim who suits our image of what a victim should look like. Carey Mulligan gives a masterful performance and the film's delivery and pacing brings us to what ends up seeming like an inevitable yet heart wrenching conclusion. This is a truly great film. With a great and memorable performance. You should watch it. You should definitely watch it. It won't make you laugh. But it will stay with you in a way that few films do. It may even change you. Or something inside you. It is that powerful. It is that good.

You People (2023)

Not funny. But still well worth watching.

[9/10 · 10 March 2023]

You People contains a cast of some very funny people. And it's co-written by Jonah Hill, who is a funny and very talented guy. His documentary about his therapist, Stutz, is wonderfully done and very touching. But You People is not funny. In fact it is the only time I can think of, since Saturday Night Live, that I've caught Julia Louis Dreyfus is something where she wasn't funny. Maybe you'll snicker or titter here or there. But you'll never outright laugh. The characters and their actions are too cliché, too we've seen all this before, to be funny. The first three quarters of the film are watchable, but just barely so. So, it's supposed to be a comedy film, and it's not funny. The majority of it is barely watchable. At least according to me. So why did I give You People such a high score? Why do I recommend You People. Because it ends up, and I don't even know if this was fully intentional, as a Romeo and Juliet story about how race, especially in America, above all in the U. S., but in most places, has become such a dividing and political issue for parents, more than their children, that it can make it very difficult, if not impossible for young and younger lovers of different races to stay together. And, like so many things, we thought we were past this. What You People wonderfully illustrates is that the outward reasons and behaviors may have changed, but the divisions have become political and social rather than blatant racism. I don't know if You People set out to be that kind of movie. It seems to have set out, or at least it promises to be a comedy. Instead it ends up being a very good social commentary film. So, don't expect to laugh. But do watch the film. It will makes you think. It will make you ponder. It just won't, and I can't stress this enough, make you laugh. Not even a little.

Lady Macbeth (2016)

Haunting. Disturbinicg.

[10/10 · 9 March 2023]

Lady Macbeth the film has nothing to do with the Shakespeare play. Except the the lead character played wonderfully by Florence Pugh is driven to commit atrocity, and after that, more atrocity. In that way she is more like Macbeth thanh is wife. "I am in blood / Stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o'er". It seems each act makes the next almost inevitable. But this is a film, based on a novel, that speaks very much to the position of a woman in the 19th century, before, and largely afterwards. This woman, this girl's only way out of her plight is an extreme one and her choices are perpetual misery or forbidden acts. The film is a moody and dark film, befitting its subject, shown largely by flowing one tableau into another. It is not something you would watch if you want light viewing or have moral qualms. Our protagonist, if you would call her that, and I think she bears some protagonistic properties and definitely sympathies despite her actions, is not one who is easy to like, or perhaps should be liked. But we can put ourselves in her place and imagine at least what it would be like. And the film makes us see her. Really see her. In all her dimensions. Lady Macbeth is not a film for everyone. But it is a superb and compelling film. Not an easy film. But that is largely what makes it such a great film.

The Great (2020–2023)

Better than funny

[10/10 · 3 March 2023]

I'm old enough to remember a time when Elle Fanning was just Dakota Fanning's adorable little sister. I think we may have arrived at a time when Dakota is known as Elle's sister. Elle has done some other really good work. But she really comes into her own, and I mean into her own, with The Great. This superbly written comedy based very loosely and hilariously on the life of Catherine the Great has Elle playing her as a young woman/girl who first comes from Germany to find herself the wife of Russian Czar Peter, played with gut laughing vacuity and yet, oddly charm, by Nicholas Hoult. Catherine is a bright and well educated woman who is faced with a Russian court that is, well, neither. And from there the comedy ensues. And, while the entire cast is brilliant, the show hinges on Elle Fanning's ability to be funny. And does she ever deliver. Her timing and her performance are note perfect. I've seen her handle drama extremely well. But comedy is a different animal. It is actually very hard for an attractive person to be funny because they're just not funny to look at and we have a weird tendency to take attractive people seriously. And Elle Fanning has grown to be a very beautiful young woman. It seems odd and unfair to say that a beautiful person has anything to overcome but, when it comes to playing comedy, they really do. Comedy, to do it well, as any actor would tell you, is actually very difficult. It requires timing and pathos and just the right balance between energy and constraint. And Elle Fanning, at this young age, shows herself to be a master at it. The show itself is brilliant. Fall off your seat funny. Not titter funny but legitimately hilarious. You'd be a fool not to watch it. Or a member of the show's version of the Russian court.

Skinamarink (2022)

Not like anything you've seen

[10/10 · 2 March 2023]

Skinamarink is a very strange movie. From the very beginning you aren't quite sure what is going on, and you keep thinking that around every corner you're going to find out, and you do find out some things, but you are very literally left in the dark for the entire film. Obviously shot on a less than shoestring budget, Skinamarink makes lack of budget and lack of everything a kind of budget. Like X it disguises itself as a film from a much earlier era. And like Blair Witch Project it uses POV as the basis for the entire film. But this is where Skinamarink is so very different. It is a POV of a small child and what we see is very little: ankles and ceilings and open or closed doors or part of the TV. You might be looking at a domed light fixture and just that while sounds happen and then the film cuts and your looking at the TV or building blocks. What the film makers manage to do is to create a claustrophobic atmosphere reminiscent of Polanski's Repulsion or something from Kubrick's early works. You don't know what you're looking at but you know something is very wrong and that is getting worse. The story, if we can call it that, of two children who wake up in a house where their parents appear and disappear and doorways and windows appear and disappear doesn't so much move forward as in a downwards spiral that we can barely understand, that we can barely see, that we can barely grasp. Skinamarink definitely isn't for everyone. It's a difficult movie to follow. But if you do, I think you'll find, as I did, a tense and moody horror film that is unlike any other horror film you've ever watched.

The Card Counter (2021)

Vintage Schrader

[9/10 · 26 February 2023]

The Card Counter is not what you would typically call entertainment. You wouldn't expect it to be coming from the writer of Taxi Driver. But this is the writer/director Paul Schrader who gave us the much underrated and moving work Affliction, based on the work of the wonderful Russell Banks. This Paul Schrader does not need to shock us or get in our face. This Paul Schrader works in the unsaid, the subtext, the thing lying beneath the surface, sometimes so deep that we ourselves do not really know it. On the surface Card Counter is about what it's title says it is about: A poker player who is very good at counting cards and calculating the odds, played by Oscar isaac, who doesn't seem to know how to give a poor performance. But simmering underneath Isaac's seemingly cool, even cold exterior is a man who spent years in military prison, one of those who took the fall for the "enhanced interrogation" going on at rendering sights during the wars with Afghanistan and Iraq. We find this out because a young man comes into his life bent on revenge for a father who suffered the same fate and committed suicide. Despite his cautious and detached approach to the world Isaac's character does not turn the young man away. Like many of Paul Schrader's characters he cannot hide from his darkness. The Card Counter is a tense psychological drama. Beautifully acted and beautifully told. Isaac in particular is wonderful. The mature Paul Schrader does not show us as much violence the way he did in Taxi Driver or many of his early films. The violence in The Card Counter is for the most part an unseen violence that happens inside human beings. But it is there. And it is very much compelling. Card Counter is still very much vintage Paul Schrader. It just also happens to be a very mature and more thoughtful, more pensive Paul Schrader.

The Courier (2020)

Watch it to the end

[9/10 · 12 February 2023]

For Benedict Cumberbatch dolls who will watch anything just because he's in it, (not a criticism. Aside from being a great actor, he's one of the few who I've yet to catch out in anything truly bad) you will be rewarded for your faith and have it renewed in your favourite actor by watching this film all the way through. But for some, myself included I'm afraid, I found it a bit dull and standard spy caper stuff for the first two thirds of the movie. Based on a true story about a British business man who is recruited into a very high level soviet cold war spy information exchange at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, there's a lot of dinners and drinking and secret meetings that seem to drag on. But the las third of the movie Cumberpatch turns in a performance that will shake you and astound you. That is not hyperbole. That is a fact. Yes, there is the physical aspect. But for me it was the emotional aspect that few actors could have or would have pulled off and it is more than worth hanging in there to see it. So, while I would give the first two thirds of the movie a 6 or a 7, the last part of the movie, based purely on Cumberpatch's performance is an easy 10. I gave this movie as a whole a 9. I think, if you watch the whole thing, you'll see why.

Cousins (III) (2021)

Heart hurting

[9/10 · 11 February 2023]

Watching Cousins hurt my heart. Growing up on a North American reservation, the film drove home how the indigenous experience, the crushing weight of colonialization. The taking away of all that is who you are: your language, your connection to your people, even your memories. The schools. The churches. All in the name of... What? Making us better by making us more like them. But we can never be like them and they h take away everything that makes us be like us. And what is left is... Lost. We use the word cousin here to speak about those who are of the same people. This movie tells the story of three actual cousins and their struggle, against all odds to stay connected. It is heart hurting. And it is beautiful. Cousins is, above all other things, beautiful.

X (II) (2022)

Way too good to be just a genre film

[10/10 · 9 October 2022]

X is a throwback film. A tribute to the horror movies of the 1970s. But it manages to do that with a sophistication that defies the very films it is paying tribute to. It is a film that lets it's mood do it's work for it. You're drawn in almost instantly but it never stoops to just being a gore film. It is tense and frightening. It's well acted and masterfully directed. You just don't expect X to be as good as it is. That's not to say there isn't gore. There is. Though not as much as you'd expect. This above all is a well made suspense horror. Fans of the genre will watch it and like it because it delivers. But you do not need to be a fan of the genre to really like this film. X is one of those films that defies its genre. And that's what really good films are supposed to do. Now I just have to watch all of Ti West's other films.

American Anarchist (2016)

Fascinating

[8/10 · 1 October 2022]

A fascinating, though often muddled look at the author of the most iconic revolutionary's handbook. Now that he has grown older and less reflexively hardcore, how does he feel about writing a book that has been used, not just by revolutionaries, but by criminals. The very thought that there is an individual who wrote this manual that tells people how to make explosives and improvised weapons among other things. To find out there is a thoughtful huma being behind this book comes as the first shock. On one hand you expect him to apologize. On the other you want him to stand behind his work. He does both and the film meanders just a bit in trying to get to know this author of one the most infamous books ever written. In the end you get gripping and insightful film making. Well worth watching.

The Boys (2019– )

What more could you ask for from a show?

[10/10 · 29 September 2022]

Outrageously fun. Outrageously funny. Outrageously gross. Just outrageous. And the best use of the C word since Deadwood. A superb cast led by Karl Urban in a show with that Seth Rogen sensibility, The Boys turns the superhero genre on it's head. There is something here for everybody. Action. Comedy. Great special effects. Over the top violence. Even drama and a dark commentary on what society would really do if it had superheroes. And, unlike a lot of shows, The Boys doesn't lag in its following seasons. If anything it gets better. Watching this show is not an effort. It's a pleasure. It's an addiction. Yes, I'm saying it's that good. Why should you watch this show? Just start watching, and within the very first few seconds you'll want to see more. It's everything a show should be. And there's Karl Urban's use of the C word. Must be seen to be understood, but he does it as well and as often as Al in Deadwood. And that's saying a lot!

Gold (I) (2022)

Gold is quirky but well worth while

[29 September 2022]

Gold, not to be confused with the Matthew Mcconaughey film, is a strange and quirky movie set in the not too distant bleak future, in which a migrant worker, Efron, is travelling to an outpost for a new not too pleasant job. Along the way he and his driver, played by Anthony Hayes, discover an exposed gold rock that is too heavy for them to move. Hayes decides to leave and go get equipment to move the gold, while Efron stays and guards the gold. No names are ever used or assigned to the characters. The problem for Efron, who the movie is really centered around, is that he is being left in the desert with few supplies and no way of knowing when the driver is returning. This movie is a strange one. It has elements of Waiting for Godot type of absurdity, The Treasure of Sierra Madre's way of looking at the madness of greed with a little bit of Polanski's Repulsion thrown in the way we see this man's descent into madness from the inside. Zac Efron has shown a real desire and ability to take risky roles and he is a very good actor. More than up to carrying a film pretty much on his own. Not everyone is going to like Gold. It's very dark and quirky. I absolutely loved it. I wouldn't recommend it for everybody. But if you like smaller films that squirm around and make you squirm, then this film is a rare find. It is a very good film even it it's not for everybody. Much better than the Matthew Mcconaughey Gold at the very least.

Darkness Falls (2020)

What did I expectÉ

[2/10 · 29 September 2022]

A hackneyed plot. Sloppy exposition. Characters that barely qualify as having dimension. I don't know why I started it. Seemed like a good title. I guess I was hoping this would turn out to be one of those undiscovered low budget gems. And the actors, Shawn Ashmore and Gary Cole in particular have done better work. But this one doesn't really even try to be a good movie. The premise that a cop, Ashmore, who loses his wife to a supposed suicide, begins to suspect a father and son pair of serial killers who are killing powerful and successful women because of a deep set misogyny that goes back to their childhood. A movie about misogyny and there isn't a female lead of any kind. Huh. That seems, well. Misogynistic. Not to be confused with the 2003 horror movie of the same name, Darkness Falls isn't even good enough to be awful. It's just stupid. And boring. Why did I watch the whole thing? Unfortunately I have an OCD thing that I have to finish every movie or book, no matter how awful that I start. But you don't even have to start it. Watch paint dry. At least that doesn't pretend or promise to be interesting. And even that would be less a waste of your time.

The Split (2018–2022)

Why isn't Nicola Walker a Star????

[9/10 · 29 July 2022]

I want to talk to you about a show called The Split, but I want to talk to you about it mainly, not because it's a great show, it definitely is, or because you should watch it, you most definitely should, but it gives me a chance to talk about one of the most extraordinary and talented actors working in the industry, Nicola Walker. Never heard of her? Shame on you. You'll definitely recognize her face. She's worked a lot. But she doesn't always get a chance to shine out because she is not always given the lead role. I first discovered her way back in the ground breaking and brilliant series Cracker, where she is in an episode where she plays the wife of a serial killer who has know idea, no conception that her husband could be capable of doing what he does. The moment that she finds out, that was one of the first series to have sense to just stay on the actor even when there is no dialogue, you watch as the realization overcomes her and the horror overcomes her, and she does this so well, so powerfully that I instantly had to know who this actor was. And she has become one of a handful of actors that if she is in something I am going to watch it. When she does get to shine out like in the wonderful and must watch series River, (Seriously, it's an absolute must watch!) you do not forget her. This woman isn't good. She isn't great. She's Judi Dench great. She's Cate Blanchett great. And I do not use those names lightly. And in The Split she's the lead and she's allowed to shine. And she does. This is the kind of actor who can say more with a flicker of the eye or slight turn of the head than most actors can say with an entire speech. And to make things even better she is surrounded by by an absolutely stunning cast. It is testimony to how great she is that she shines out among such brilliant actors. There is not one person in the cast who is not so believable in their role that you never even give thought to their acting. The Split is about a firm and family of divorce lawyers, the trials of their professional and personal lives. In the hands of lesser actors, and lesser writers this could have been very soap opera-ish or taken a very cynical view of the world but instead it becomes about these people trying to come out of what are the most terrible experiences in people's lives with some humanity intact. We see the stereotype sharks of divorce law but this family and this firm strive for decency and humanity when human instincts may be at their worst. Sometimes they succeed. Sometimes they don't. And their own lives are messy too. Though The Split will often bring you to body wracking tears it never ever allows itself to become a soap opera. It can't. The acting is too good. The writing is too good. Oh, and did I mention Nicola Walker? I may have forgotten to mention Nicola Walker. Nicola Walker is in it. And she is reason to watch anything.

Light from Light (2019)

Haunting. A Movie that actually deserves to be watched.

[10/10 · 14 June 2022]

"Light, seeking light, doth light of light beguile; So ere you find where light in darkness lies, Your light grows dark by losing of your eyes." Light from Light is not a new movie. Though it is dealing with the paranormal one would not describe this film as spooky or a suspenseful. What Light from Light does is far more remarkable. It is a beautifully sad and haunting little movie that never makes a false step or allows itself to be false. Writer/Director Paul Harrill never gives in to the impulse to be gaudy or to scare us as so many of those moving furniture movies try to do. What he does is to tell a story of mourning and sadness tinging it with a little bit of hope. Marin Ireland, one of the most underrated and underused female actors out there, is, as always, wonderful as an ordinary understated woman who happens to have had hints of paranormal experience and is "in between" paranormal investigation groups, working at a car rental company. She's contacted by a priest after doing a local radio interview, who asks her to visit a widower who may be having paranormal experiences. Jim Gaffigan plays the widower. One would not immediately think of casting a comedian like Gaffigan in a role where there is no comedy, tremendous sadness and an undertow of rage, but he is perfect. There is something about his size and awkwardness that makes him so right for the role and it turns out that he can act. He is not just good. I'll say it again. He's perfect. Light from Light might not be for everyone. It's a very quiet movie. Maybe a bit of a sad movie. If you like explosions, super heroes, car crashes, moving furniture, slasher movies perhaps this is not the movie for you. But Light from Light is definitely haunting. In the truest meaning of the word. It deserves to be watched. And what better thing can you say about a film?

Russian Doll (2019–2022)

Natasha Lyonne is a red headed diamond

[10/10 · 26 April 2022]

There seems to be a fascination lately in revisiting the Groundhog Day premise of having someone trapped in a time loop that repeats the same day over and over again. There have been a number of movies that did so and they weren't bad. And then there's Russian Doll. Of all the attempts to attack the premise this series by far is the the best. Its secret is in its mad cap pacing and witty dialogue, in being more like a very smart Marx Brothers movie than like the Bill Murray original. Really its secret is Natasha Lyonne, who is also one its co-creators. You may know her from Orange Is The New Black. But once you see Russian Doll you'll realize she doesn't belong as a supporting actor. This woman belongs right in front of the camera all of the time. It's her comic energy, her ability to toss out witty fast paced dialogue while driving the madcap plot that makes it all work so well, that makes you laugh out loud despite the lingering darkness of the storyline. She isn't a hidden gem. She's a red headed diamond. Somehow you believe that she is both brilliant and a little bit insane. Russian Doll is a fully modern comedy despite its madcap Marx Brothers feel. There is excessive drug and alcohol abuse. There is swearing and bad parenting and suicide. Do not watch it if you want clean fun. But if you want smart fun... If you want to laugh so hard it literally hurts... If you want to see what comic genius really looks like... Watch Russian Doll. There's even a new season. Which is good. Because more Natasha Lyonne is what the world really needs.

Yellowstone (2018– )

Yellowstone, As Good as They Get

[10/10 · 14 April 2022]

I feel silly writing a review of Yellowstone. If you haven't watched this series yet, why not? Do you not like great television? Are you turned off by TV shows that are too deep and too beautiful? I don't know what to say to convince you except that Yellowstone is among the greatest television shows ever made. Yes, I would and I do compare it to Game of Thrones, The Sopranos or Deadwood. I spent most of my long life hating Kevin Costner but, as John Dutton, the patriarch of a Montana ranching family that is holding on to what it has by its fingernails, he is excellent. Everybody wants take away what they have. There's a nearby Reservation that wants the land returned to them. Companies that want to turn the land into resorts. And none of the children are certain they want to be part of Dutton's legacy. Writer and co-creator Taylor Caldwell doesn't pull any punches. Ranchers are hard men. And Dutton is the hardest of them all. Costner, as much as I used to hate him, is a superb grizzled ranch owner. We see the hardness. We understand his will to hang on to the land even as others try to take it from him. He loves his children. He just doesn't do it very well. He's too hard and set in his ways for that. The rest of cast is superb. There's not a false step anywhere. They're all, the children, the ranch hands, and his enemies fully fledged human beings, three dimensional, well written and excellently acted. Add the the breathtaking scenery the haunting use of the very best of country music (even if you're not a country music fan, these songs will haunt you...) add just the right amount of humour and you get a series that can and should be watched more than once. It isn't good. It's great. We're at the climax of the golden age of television. And among all the great offerings out there Yellowstone will still stand out as a rare and magnificent gem. It shouldn't be reviewed. It should be applauded. And now you can also watch the superb prequel 1883. Watch them both. And then watch them again. And again. Or don't. Maybe you hate great television. If that's you, then there's more than enough reality TV or formula glibness out there for you. It may be the golden age of television. But the bottom part of the pile is still more than full of... Well, maybe, what some people like...

1883 (2021–2022)

Taylor Sheridan Does It Again!

[10/10 · 14 April 2022]

This prequel to Yellowstone (If you haven't watched Yellowstone, watch it, or shame on you...) does what I thought was impossible: It follows perfectly in the footsteps of Lonesome Dove. (If you haven't watched that or read the book, shame on you...) It is not Yellowstone. It doesn't try to be Yellowstone. It tries to capture the horror and hardships of a wagon train on the Oregon Trail. And, oh, does it succeed. It manages to to that and be breathtakingly beautiful at the same time. Sheridan does that by using a daring tactic for a male writer. He tells the story from the point of view of a teenage girl: Elsa Dutton the daughter of James and Margaret Dutton. For those of you who have watched Yellowstone you know that these are the ancestors of the Duttons that we've come to know so well. By taking Elsa's point of view Sheridan is able to open up his language, to express himself poetically, to use a female voice, to see this harsh but beautiful world from a female point of view. But that is difficult thing to do. Taylor Sheridan succeeds magnificently. Elsa might be one of his finest creations, superbly realized by Isabel May. She is fully and completely alive, perhaps the bravest character we are likely to meet. In lesser hands she could come off as naive or reckless but Sheridan and May give us a fully realized powerful character who drives the story and helps us see the beauty even in the most brutal things. If May doesn't turn out to be a major star I'll be very surprised. The role required somebody special. Ands she is very special. And then there are her parents played by pair of country singers, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill. That could be a disaster. That should be a disaster. But I looked, I really looked for flaws in their acting, and there is none. McGraw in fact isn't just good. He's great. He never gives in to easy emotion but stays true to his character and fights the emotion with all of his might. And then there is the veteran actor Sam Elliot. God I love Sam Elliot. I loved him in The Big Lebowski. I loved him in Rush. He is an underrated and wonderful actor. He anchors this cast. We never see a false moment. And when the moment requires depth he is more than deep enough. The entire cast is great. The writing, of course, is superb. And the show as a whole never takes a false step. 1883 may, like Lonesome Dove, bring the Western back. If it does I doubt very much those that follow in its footsteps will make quite such an impression. Unless of course Taylor Caldwell continues to write other Westerns. Watch 1883. And then watch it again. It's that good.