Another Earth (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8hEwMMDtFY

Dir: Mike Cahill

Starring: William Mapother, Brit Marling

                Rhoda (Brit Marling) is a promising young teenager, about to go off to MIT when she has an accident due to drink driving after her celebration party. While trying to see a new planet from her car window she crashes into a family, killing the mother and child. After spending some time in prison she comes out, depressed and directionless. She goes to apologise to the husband, John Burroughs (William Mapother), but loses her nerve and lies about her intentions and they end up striking up a relationship all the while a mysterious other earth has appeared in the sky.

                The film has a great premise in the appearance of another planet, which looks like earth, appearing in the sky. The film is at its most interesting when dealing with the potential ideas of the planet being a mirror image of earth or perhaps the earth from a parallel universe. Everyone has wondered what their life could have been if they had made different choices in life. This is the question that Rhoda is plagued with; could there be a different Rhoda Williams up there who didn’t ruin her life and the lives of others? Who fulfilled her potential and now leads the life she could have had? It is this question that leads her to submit an essay to try and win a ticket aboard a craft which will fly to the other planet. Rhoda and John argue over the trip, as John is so enveloped in his own pain and loss that he only sees the trip as another experience for pain.

                Unfortunately the film doesn’t fully realise the potential of its idea. A scene where a scientist attempts to make contact with the other earth and ends up talking to the other version of herself is both exciting and scary and more scenes like this would have been welcome. The film instead chooses to focus on the forming relationship between Rhoda and John and the tension that Rhoda will eventually have to come clean about who she really is. It is a well handled and played relationship but it is not anything original. The film could have been two films with the potentially better and more interesting one being the science fiction film which took the premise of another earth and attempted to realise its full potential, and the other being about the relationship between Rhoda and John. You end up wishing they’d been able to go for the bigger science fiction film rather than what they ended up with.

                A competent film with able performances from all and a great final shot but the film fails to capitalise on its interesting and ambitious premise, instead sticking too firmly in an unoriginal relationship. An interesting watch, but pretty forgettable.

3 out of 5 Buttons

Shame (2011)

 Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arD1Hmjlqag

Dir: Steve McQueen

Starring: Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan, James Badge Dale

                The award winning artist and filmmaker, Steven McQueen, follows up his impressive debut Hunger with a film about sexual addiction.

                Brandon lives a comfortable lifestyle in a high level position of a successful company in New York. He is a handsome and charming man who woman are drawn to. He is also a sex addict. His routine and life are shaken when his sister comes to stay with him for a few days.

                The fantastic first scene firmly conveys Brandon’s character to the viewer. We first meet Brandon as he lies in bed and we see his daily routine intercut with an encounter on a subway train. Intercutting his mornings with a wordless interaction with a woman on a subway train, the film conveys people’s attitude and confliction with attraction and sex. Brandon stares at the woman who eventually notices his looks and is flattered. We take his point of view as he looks over her body. Over time we see the woman’s face change from mutual attraction to a picture of guilt and shame as we see the wedding ring on her finger. We see Brandon follow her, not deterred by the symbol of marriage, a man who just wants to have sex with her. A sex addict looking for gratification from a human being, no matter what the fallout.

                The film is a character study of a man living with a sexual addiction. It is wound into every part of his life and is always on his mind. He masturbates, hires prostitutes and uses pornography at home and at work. It is a realistic depiction of a person living with a sex addiction. It is not sensationalised or glamorised in any way. It is a part of his life that is worked into his routine, a part that he lives with. Brandon is a normal successful man, charming and kind and able to interact with people around him but part of his life is consumed by his addiction to sex. He is ashamed of it but, like most addicts, he is not able to overcome it, he can only live his life with it as part of him. In a world where sex addiction can be seen as a funny thing, something which a lot of people don’t see as real addiction, the film shows it for what it really is. Something which cannot be controlled but which can control lives; an addiction just as real as drug or alcohol addiction.

                Michael Fassbender, here working with Steve McQueen for the second time, puts in a wonderful performance, showing why he is one of the best actors working today. Brandon is a solitary man who keeps people at a distance, who isn’t able to sustain a relationship over a couple of months, always looking for the next woman to have sex with. In a brilliant scene we see him having a threesome, a typical male fantasy, and we watch as Brandon’s face turns into one of guilt and sadness at what he is. His relationship with Sissy, played well by Carey Mulligan, is a strained one. There are details to it and their past which are never explained but they do not have to be. They share a love for one another but they cannot be with each other. They are two different personalities which clash. Michael and Carey’s scenes play out with an undercurrent of unease as playful interactions can become aggressive. Sissy turns up and upsets Brandon’s routine and his life becomes even more strained, in danger of breaking the balance he has created.

The film is wonderfully directed and shot with several scenes consisting of one take which lasts over several minutes which are uncomfortable but exhilarating and illuminating. The score adds and lifts the film, working in harmony with the visuals and often bringing the scenes to an emotional and powerful crescendo.

Steven McQueen has created another great film with another great performance from Fassbender. It may be uncomfortable at times but it is always powerful and emotive. An engaging and fascinating look at an important topic which is too often overlooked. A brilliant character study that will stay with you long after you’ve left the cinema.

5 out of 5 Buttons

(Note: this was seen at an advanced preview with an interesting and informative Q & A with the director. Shame will be out in January 2012.)

Take Shelter (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5U4TtYpKIc

Dir: Jeff Nichols

Starring: Michael Shannon, Jessica Chastain, Shea Whigham

                Curtis is a family man who works in construction. His daughter is deaf and the family gets by on his wage and what his wife brings in through boot sales and sewing work. Curtis starts to have nightmares and delusions surrounding an apocalyptic storm which he fears will come true.  He decides to renovate the storm shelter in his back yard, a decision which threatens to tear his family apart.

                Michael Shannon turns in an impressive performance of a man on the edge, in danger of snapping at any time. He is a man who cares deeply for his wife and daughter; they are the reasons he starts to build the shelter, to protect them when the storm comes. However, his decision to work on the shelter creates rifts in his family as he spends more and more money on it, money which they do not have. Curtis starts to alienate those around him as his dreams include his wife and friend attacking him. He is unable to deal with the life like dreams and as such becomes cold and distant to those around him. The film shows how the people around him cope with his change in behaviour and with what appears to be the onset of a mental illness which will change his and their lives. It comes to a head in a scene where Curtis shouts at assembled members of the community, his frustration and fear about his mind boiling over at people who now look at him differently.

                We find out that Curtis’s mother is living in assisted care as she was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia in her mid thirties. Curtis is worried that he too has the same condition and he tries to get help while keeping it from his family. The film plays with the ambiguity of Curtis’s state of mind for much of its running time. Is he actually seeing prophetic visions of the future or is it all in his mind? Unfortunately the film gives an answer to this with an ending which can be seen as disappointing.

                The film suffers from being too long and as such starts to drag at points. It seems to have two endings, one of which seemingly comes from nowhere but would create a satisfying end point but then the film carries on into another which is unsatisfactory and perhaps drives credibility too far.

                Take Shelter is a film which holds some interesting points about mental illness and the people who cope with it, both those with the illness and those around them. It features some good performances but unfortunately is hampered by a bloated running time and troublesome endings.

3 out of 5 Buttons

We need to talk about Kevin (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLRgAe2jLaw

Dir: Lynne Ramsay

Starring: Tilda Swinton, Ezra Miller, John C. Reilly

                Lynne Ramsay tackles Lionel Shriver’s award winning novel. Eva (Tilda Swinton) is a happy travel writer living in the city with her husband Franklin (John C. Reilly). When she becomes pregnant with Kevin (Jasper Newell as the child Kevin and Ezra Miller and the teenage Kevin) she exchanges her life for parenthood. However, Kevin does not turn out to be the angelic child that all parents want and we see the fallout that he causes.

                The film is in essence a horror film with Kevin as the evil child. However, the film places itself in the real world so rather than Kevin being possessed by a demon, it poses the question of nature versus nurture. Did Kevin turn out the way he did because of his upbringing and the environment around him or was he born this way, inevitably heading towards a terrible act? As we see it through Eva’s eyes, our view of Kevin is tainted as him being evil, a problem from birth. However, we also see connections between Kevin and Eva, the juxtaposition of their faces above a sink of water, Kevin and Eva lining up chewed nails and egg shell along a table. When Kevin accuses Eva of being harsh and she turns it back on him he asks her ‘I wonder where I got it from’, placing the blame on her. The film gives us evidence to suggest that it has been Eva’s negative influence on Kevin that has made him turn out this way, a product of his environment. Kevin’s reason for his actions even puts blame on society as he says that he did it for the notoriety, because everyone watching television are watching people like him. The film toys with both ideas, never really giving an answer either way.

                The films horror lies in the fear of parenthood. It plays with the worry of every parent that their child will be horrible, that they will end up hating them and will have nothing in common. As Kevin grows and Franklin bonds with Kevin, Eva is made more isolated from the family unit. When the second child, Celia, comes along it seems that the family would be perfect were it not for Kevin. Kevin ruins Eva’s life, from her having to give up her job and her life in the city she loves, to being a housewife living in the suburbs and eventually the loss of her marriage. Kevin not only takes her family but also her life from Eva as she is forced to live a hated and hollow life after Kevin’s actions, fearful of those around her and vilified for her connection to him. Eva is placed with the blame; Kevin’s actions were her fault. She is tied to her child for life; his actions are directly linked to her. Kevin is the child as the ultimate STD. At the end of the film we see  Kevin finally scared as he is being moved to adult prison and Eva and Kevin hug and it is in this moment we see a connection between them, mother comforting her son because despite all that Kevin has done, he is still her child.

Adaptations of well known and loved novels can often be seen as problematic and a disservice to the original source material. Lynne Ramsey handles what could have been a difficult adaption with skill, transferring the important themes of the novel effectively into the film.  The film obviously has to miss out a lot of parts from the book so that it can fit into a film running time but there are some parts which feel like they have been stuck in because they were part of the book but not elaborated on. For example Kevin’s masturbation with the door open is seen as a taunting attack on Eva in the book but in the film it just seems like an odd aside. However, these do not adversely affect the film, perhaps just sticking out as odd to anyone who has not read the book.

                Tilda Swinton plays Eva well, conveying her fear, loathing and guilt effectively. Her gaunt face shows the tiredness and the weight that is placed on her during motherhood and because of Kevin. Ezra Miller, previously seen in the television series Californication, is a revelation as Kevin, menacing and horrible yet eventually letting us see a human side. The only problem is the casting of John C. Reilly against type from his more well known comic roles. He never really fits into the role as he should, awkwardly sticking out in a dramatic role.

                We need to talk about Kevin is a confident and well executed novel adaptation conveying the ultimate fear of parenthood with a memorable turn from newcomer Ezra Miller. It may put you off having kids for life.

4 out of 5 Buttons

In Time (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdadZ_KrZVw

Dir: Andrew Niccol

Starring: Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Cillian Murphy

                The director of GATTACA brings us a new high concept science fiction action film. In the future, people are genetically engineered to stop aging at 25. However, when they reach this age a timer starts on their arm. The conceit is that time literally is money and people work to earn time and buy things using time but once the clock on their arm runs out, they die. Justin Timberlake is Will Salas, a man who has to work every day to stay alive. After he saves a rich man, Henry Hamilton (Matt Bomer), from gangsters, Henry gives Will over 100 years of time before committing suicide.  Will lives as part of the rich elite before trying to spread the wealth of the world more evenly while being pursued by Raymond Leon (Cillian Murphy), a timekeeper, who believes he has murdered Henry for his time.

                The film’s most interesting point is its central idea.  The world is fully thought out and realistic to the premise. There are various setting details which end up becoming part of the plot such as the church which gives out time to poor people and the arm wrestling game where people fight over time and which can end up in death, which help create a realistic world. The dialogue also reflects the world in which there is no money, only time and it is these details which makes it the best and most fun aspect of the film.

                The film casts an eye to the economic problems at the moment. It depicts the poor people living day to day, having to work hard for another days worth of time just to do it all again the next day only to survive. In the mean time the cost of living keeps on rising. However, in the rich districts, the people who have plenty of time, live the good life, and never run because they all have so much time they never need to. The rich keep the prices in the poor districts rising so that they end up running out of time and the rich can stay in time. The recent 99% protests in America and other countries around the world reflect in Will’s attempt to change the economy of the world he lives in, attempting to redistribute the wealth of the rich back to the poor.

                The film runs in to several problems. Some of the acting is awkward, particularly Justin Timberlake, previously so good in The Social Network, and Amanda Seyfried playing the dull rich girl Sylvia Weis. Also as the film opens up, gaping plot holes begin to show which are very difficult to over look. It is a shame that such laziness has occurred in the story telling when the setting has been so well thought out. The romance between Will and Sylvia is obvious and ridiculously quick as she falls madly in love with him after having known him for 4 hours in which time he held a gun to her head, kidnapped her and almost killed her in a car crash. You won’t care about the characters by the end, only hoping that the time really would run out soon.

                The biggest problem with the film is its plotting. For a film about a lack of time it meanders aimlessly. Once Will gains all the time we are never really sure what he intends to do with it, we are led to believe that he will use it for good but the film bumbles around before attempting to make him into a Robin Hood figure which never really works. The film drags on, traipsing about so that your attention fades from the numbers counting down on the characters forearms to the watch strapped around your own wrist. The film has too many loose plot strands. Will is pursued by a gangster from the poor district and the time keepers from the rich district but while the gangster is the more interesting and fun character he is sidelined, only to pop up a couple of times while the focus is kept on the dull timekeepers.

                An interesting concept is wasted in a film populated with dodgy acting, plot holes and directionless plotting. A disappointment when there is such an interesting idea to be used.

2 out of 5 Buttons

Tyrannosaur (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvyqXFmV-LI

Dir: Paddy Considine

Starring: Peter Mullan, Olivia Coleman, Eddie Marsan

                British actor Paddy Considine turns director as he adapts his Bafta winning short Dog Altogether into a full length film. Peter Mullan plays Joseph, a widower who struggles to keep his violent actions in check. Joseph meets Hannah while hiding in her charity shop, a woman who is abused by her husband but who retreats from her life with a combination of Christianity and alcohol.  

                Considine’s film is a tough watch. It has scenes of violence against both humans and animals and domestic abuse. The characters live in a world of violence, one in which they cannot break out of. However, it is a very real life in which some people find themselves. The violence is never done for the sake of violence; it lies over the film, affecting all the lives of those who live in the area. Violence is the binder that brings the characters together and connects them. Joseph is a violent person, angry at the world and everyone in it. He tries to push it down but it’s all he knows, it’s his way of acting out at a world he finds has turned against him. Hannah, a woman who lives in the affluent area of the town, finds herself trapped in a violent relationship, unable to leave but torn apart by her current existence. The film is held by the relationship between Hannah and Joseph. Hannah is just looking for help and kindness, a believer that everyone has kindness in them. Joseph is a man who admits he is horrible and is reluctant to let anyone close to him, but he is also capable of compassion. Scenes in which he keeps visits his friend dying of cancer and looks out for the young child next door help round out the character. Their relationship never becomes saccharine or clichéd and the film builds to a believable conclusion. 

Considine uses his previous film experience to bring out wonderful performances from his cast. The film is a master class in acting with Olivia Coleman being as good as everyone has said, her Hannah bearing the terrible fear and pain of being in an abusive relationship but having to hide it in her everyday life. Peter Mullan displays Joseph’s torn personality; a violent man who struggles to keep his actions in check but is also has the capacity for great empathy. Eddie Marsan’s performance has been unfairly overlooked for praise, as he expertly plays the abusive James, a man who could believably exist in polite society, someone you could live next to and not suspect a thing. With one hand action he conveys a sense of dread more strongly than any horror film out this year.

                If you can handle its bleak violence and subject matter you’ll find a powerful film with some great performances. Tyrannosaur is one of the best British films of the year and it marks Considine as a new talented filmmaker.

4 out of 5 Buttons

What's your Number? (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9stplJF1ek

Dir: Mark Mylod

Starring: Anna Faris, Chris Evans

Anna Faris is Ally, a twenty something single woman living in the city who has problems with guys. After being fired she finds out that 96% of women who have slept with more than 20 men don’t get married. Since she is nearing this figure she freaks out and instead of finding a new job, decides to track down all her ex boyfriends to see if they’ve become marriage material. She enlists the help of her handsome next door neighbour Colin (Chris Evans), who is a slacker playing in an unsuccessful band and is the opposite of the perfect man she is looking for. He also just so happens to be the son of a policeman and is therefore adept at finding people. OH I WONDER IF THEY’LL GET TOGETHER AT THE END?

If you haven’t guessed the ending having read the synopsis then watch the trailer. If you haven’t guessed it after watching the trailer then I assume the cave you’ve been living in was comfy enough to spend 20 years in. The film piles on cliché after cliché, her sister is getting married, Ally has a quirky passion she hides in favour of a real job, her parents are divorced and her father is dating a much younger woman, Chris is the ‘funny’ womanising slacker with the heart of gold etc etc. There isn’t an original idea in its unfunny 100 minute run time. The film even tries to make little post modern jokes about the cliché of the situations before just ploughing on ahead with the cliché regardless.

Anna Faris is fine as a twenty something woman, and judging by all the pointless semi nudity, she definitely is a woman. Chris Evans is handsome and arrogant and can play some chords on the guitar which manages to cover the depth of his character quite well. Other vaguely recognisable actors appear with the only effect being that their bank balance should have gone up slightly. None of them should put this film high up on their CV.

The film raises questions which are just brushed off without explanation. How does either Ally or Colin afford their lovely, exposed brick city apartments without any means of income? Whose car does Ally steal? What happened to her job interview and how did she get it in the first place? Why the need for bestiality and paedophilia jokes? Why did I pay to watch this? The film manages to come dangerously close to actually having a message along the lines of it doesn’t matter how many people you sleep with, your number won’t mean anything to the love of your life, but then it undercuts it at the last minute with a pointless gag involving vomit and hand jobs. The film does nothing to break from the conceit that all a woman wants and needs is a man to fall in love and settle down with.

What’s your number? Is the same film you have seen a hundred times before and which will be made many more times until we all evolve into a society of telepathic, gelatinous organisms who have decided monogamy isn’t the most efficient mode of behaviour to ensure the survival of the species. If you want to watch an original, funny and intelligent Rom-com, watch Annie Hall, Easy A or (500) Days of Summer. And if you’ve already seen them, watch them again.

1 out of 5 Buttons

Red State (2011)

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ1v6oFHefc

Dir: Kevin Smith

Starring: John Goodman, Michael Parks, Melissa Leo

Kevin Smith takes a break from his usual genre of the slacker comedy to tackle action and horror in Red State. The film begins with three teens (Michael Anagarano, Nicholas Braun and Kyle Gallner) in southern states America who find a woman on the internet who will have sex with them. After travelling out to her trailer, they are drugged and find themselves held captive in a church, about to become the unwilling victims of a murderous sermon of the congregation of the Five Points Church.

The film takes aim at hardcore Christian groups in America, more specifically the Westboro Baptist Church.  The religious sect is a great subject for horror as we already think their views and actions are monstrous, and so their murderous actions don’t seem farfetched. The film also scrutinises the government and its policy on terrorists and the Terrorism Act, its stance on culpability and its willingness to take lethal action when it perceives a threat. The Waco siege of 1993 was an obvious influence on the second half of the film. The event, in which the FBI initiated a siege on a Protestant Sect on a ranch after being unable to execute a search warrant, which lead to 76 deaths including children and pregnant women, is reflected in the siege upon the Five Points ranch, the FBI in the film ordered to kill everyone including women and children.

The film ultimately poses to us the problem of evil. Who are the bad guys in the film? The ultra conservative Christians who are killing people for what they believe is a God ordered purpose or the government who kill people because they can and who cover up the whole massacre, hiding behind legislation, and then sleeping peacefully at night?

The main problem with the film is that it does not know what genre it wants to be. It starts off as a horror as the Christian group are shown as righteous murders, willing to kill homosexuals and rampant fornicators as is God’s will. The film then wildly changes tack to become a siege action film in the vein of Assault on Precinct 13, as its focus shifts from the three terrorised teenagers, and onto Joseph Keenan (John Goodman) and his squad of police waiting outside of the church. The tension is never really built up in the beginning for the horror element to work fully and though the deaths of some characters come as a surprise at points, as the focus of the film is changed from character to character, you never really get a sense of loss when one of them dies.

However, the film is certainly entertaining and better than many of the leading reviews have proclaimed. It has some interesting themes and some good performances; Michael Parks is creepily effective and convincing as a pastor strongly attached to his religious convictions, and Goodman is always watchable as the government official struggling between his sense of right and wrong and his orders.

It’s good to see Smith trying something different, especially after a recent string of poor films, even if Red State is a slight disappointment.  It would be good to see him tackle different genres more often. 

4 out of 5 Buttons

Drive (2011)

 Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDO_OtAwV8s

Dir. Nicholas Winding Refn

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Carey Mulligan, Bryan Cranston

The film opens with Ryan Gosling’s Driver acting as wheelman for hire to a pair of thieves. Tracking the police and a basketball game on the radio, he uses the streets, shadows and eventually a crowd of revelling basketball fans to drop off his clients and blend into the night unseen. A synth song then kicks in over the soundtrack as the title appears on the screen in hot pink announcing Nicholas Winding Refn’s homage to 80’s driving movies.

The film plays out in two halves. In the first, Driver and Carey Mulligan’s Irene quietly fall for each other over a series of long looks and charged silences. It is in this half that we see the Driver’s human side as he bonds with Irene’s son whose father, Standard (Oscar Isaac), is in prison. When Standard returns the film changes gear as Standard’s criminal past catches up with him and Driver helps him out for the good of his family. The job goes wrong and the long wistful looks are changed for blasts of explicit violence and gore. Forks go in eyes, knives slice wrists and shotguns take off heads.

The shift in tone could have been jarring but it works well as the Driver’s violent side comes out because of his affection and his willingness to protect Irene and her son, despite what may happen to him. The two aspects are blended perfectly in a memorable scene in a lift where, in slow motion, the Driver kisses Irene before stamping on a man’s head till his skull crushes.

The first half of the film can seem a little slow as the arty long looks stack up but the film still retains a good pace. Those turning up to see a bullet a minute action film with car chases thrown in after every couple of lines of dialogue will be disappointed and bored by its artistic leanings and 80’s nostalgia, but these are what make the film interesting and truly great. It’s the films expertly crafted images which will stick in the mind; the driver wearing a stunt mask, framed in a window staring in at his antagonist while an operatic song soars over the top, two hands wordlessly coming together on a gear stick and Ryan Gosling chewing a toothpick, wearing a silver jacket with a golden scorpion on the back looking effortlessly cool. The film climaxes with a well edited scene which matches dialogue and violence effectively before putting us back on the road, travelling through the night.

The cast is padded out with familiar faces, Bryan Cranston (Malcolm in the Middle’s dad) being Driver’s father figure, Christina Hendricks looking beautiful in a surprisingly small role and Ron Perlman being his usual menacing self with his aggressive, bulbous face.

In a week where I saw both Drive and Thomas Alfredson’s Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy it was Winding Refn’s film that stuck in my mind in the following days. With great visuals, soundtrack, performances and atmosphere, Drive emerges as one of the best of the year.

4 out of 5 Buttons

(An alternative version of this review appears in Pulp issue 1 10/10/11)