Review: Let The Right One In

This is an outstanding contribution to cinema's long fascination with the vampyr, and brings some new spin to the subject matter. In short, boy meets girl, boy and girl fall for each other, but girl is a vampyr...

Set in a Stockholm suburb in the early 80s during a typically snowbound winter, the film focuses on Oskar, as 12-year-old boy, verging on being an albino, the only son of divorced parents, and very definitely an outcast by any measure. In between being bullied at school and being ignored by his mother, by night he befriends Eli, the new girl on the block who lives next door. Apparently unaffected by the freezing cold during their night-time meets, Eli gradually lets her hefty guard slip and slowly the two outcasts become an item of sorts.

The film glories not in gore (although as a vampyr movie inevitably there must be some blood-letting), but in the realistic mundanities of how to survive as a 12-year-old vampire. In a declaration of love and friendship, Oskar takes her to the sweetshop of buys her mixed candy: she tries it and suffers an allergic reaction (for want of a better word). Hakan, the old man she lives with, clearly both loves and fears her, while she treats him with a mixture of respect and disdain; he has the task of providing her with fresh blood - which can of course only be achieved through murder...

There's a pleasing lack of special effects or displays of vampyr powers: she says she can fly, but we only hear off-screen fluttering; and we only see the results of her final attack.

There's also a pleasing lack of info about Eli's past: while made a vampyr at the age of 12, we don't know how long she's been the undead; and we don't find out much about her relationship with Hakan,

The sense of unease, the feeling that nothing good can come of this prevails, aided by the downbeat setting, precise direction, a score that swirls from comforting to unsettling with ease, and deeply troubling sound design (ever wanted to know what a vampyr's stomach sounds like when it grumbles, now's your chance).

The principal cast are excellent, especially the two child leads, although internet scuttlebutt suggests Eli's voice is provided by another actor. Particularly fine is the scene where Oskar decides they should become blood brothers, ill-advisedly slitting his palm and offering Eli the opportunity to do the same: Eli's desire for the blood is offset by her own self-loathing and fear of revealing her true nature to him - it's exquisite.

In the end though, this is a romance (in both the original and more modern, accepted definition of the word) and love, even between the living and the undead, must triumph. This is very much the darker alternative to Twilight. See it.
Score: 8.5/10

Review: The Damned United

The Damned United is a rip-roaring Boys’ Own dream-turned-nightmare with a peach of a turn by Michael Sheen at its centre.
This is the story of Brian Clough’s 44 days in charge of Leeds United, of his overwhelming desire to beat Don Revie, the super-successful manager in whose footsteps he chose to follow.

While fully fleshing Cloughie out, he is nevertheless very much the hero of the piece (you’ll be cheering him on through every outburst, you’ll feel his hurt when scorned by Revie, by the Leeds players and most painfully by his assistant manager Timothy Spall’s Peter Taylor) – and Colm Meaney’s Revie very much the villain of the piece (the coda makes a wry and vengeful comparison between Cloughie’s subsequent success and Revie’s ensuing failure).

Slighted by Revie upon his first visit to Derby County, Clough becomes consumed by the need to beat him and his mighty Leeds. Half of Cloughie’s outbursts are on the money – he’s the only sane man in the room – and the other half are at best almost wilfully misjudged.

The feel and the look of the 60s and 70s is effortlessly created, but not slavishly so such that the production design becomes a performer in its own right (step forward Life On Mars and Ashes To Ashes). That footballing era is also wonderfully conjured, in some ways casting Cloughie as man well before his time.

The film takes a sideways glance at what was to come for football - hooliganism on and off the pitch, a sport both elevated and corrupted by growing mountains of money – without ever fully addressing them.

The film begs the question (and not unreasonably leaves it unanswered): did Clough set out to fail at Leeds? Was his hatred of Revie and his boys so great, all he wanted to do was tear the team down and erase the memory of its triumphs? Better they should be remembered for losing under him than winning – because if they won, everyone would say he had just inherited a great team from Revie…

Sheen is at his crowd-pleasing height, playing Clough with all the pomp the viewer could possibly expect. He also reveals the emotional cripple, the failed player behind all that front and mouth. If there’s a criticism of the film’s take on Clough, it’s that we learn little of the qualities that made him a great manager and gave him the title of best manager never to manage England.
By comparison with Sheen, Spall is hardly stretched, and yet no other British actor could so comfortably play Taylor happily stuck in Clough’s shadow.

Of course, die-hard, life-long Leeds fans need not see this: they didn’t warm to Cloughie then and they won’t now.

Set aside concerns about factual accuracies, or indeed changes from the book (god knows it has got its own doubters) or the Clough family’s disavowal, and just enjoy a great British film with the greatest British actor of his generation. It's a spry 97 minutes long and makes fantastic use of Fleetwood Mac's Man of the World (one of my all time faves) in a key scene that ultimately suggests those 97 minutes are about that most curious of things: male friendships.
Score: 8/10

Review: Watchmen

Watchmen is by far the most faithful adaptation of an Alan Moore comic yet to hit cinema screens – but does it trump The Dark Knight? Read on! Visually, this is the comic brought vividly and realistically to life, aided by fully realised sets and props rather than 90% blue screen and CGI.

It retains the essential structure of Moore’s work, telling the story in the order he set – meaning cross-cutting past, present and future narratives. The history of the Minutemen (the super hero team that predates the Watchmen) is superbly explained in the opening credit sequence after the death of The Comedian.

There are some nice additions by Snyder and the script adapters: a certain photograph in The Comedian’s apartment, the nods to Strangelove and Apocalypse Now, and some unexpected musical choices.

Rightly or wrongly, Rorschach (played with conviction by Jackie Earle Haley) is very much the crowd favourite of the piece – but much more so than in the comic. In choosing to excise some of his less charming traits and beliefs, Rorschach becomes a pint-sized Dirty Harry – with all the best lines.

Doc Manhattan is well-realised, cock and all, with Billy Crudup successfully conveying what little humanity is left within Big Blue.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan hints at the cynicism within The Comedian, but in so much that the character is seen only ever as someone else’s memory, there is little room for him to make an impact.

Matthew Goode brings an appropriately emotionless arrogance to Ozymandias, the most intelligent man in the world who also happens to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders.

Dan Dreiberg/Nite Owl’s impotence, sense of failure and lack of confidence is almost caught perfectly by Patrick Wilson – but I sensed something lacking in his performance, as if he didn’t believe in the material at all times.

Indeed, there’s a sense that everyone’s trying so hard to be faithful to the source that they bring none of themselves to the project and so it lacks the spark of life. This is not helped by the best actors being in the most unfeeling/darkest roles; while Rorschach is the work’s black heart, Laurie/Silk Spectre – and her relationships with Doc Manhattan and Dan – should be the emotional core of the work (often her reactions lead the audience in the comic) and I’m afraid while Malin Ackerman carries off the look (boy does she!), she fails to give weight to the character’s emotions (notwithstanding that the decision seems to have been taken to make Laurie less hysterical than in the comic).

The decision to re-work some elements of the original story are right, and the streamlining of the story to an acceptable run-time is hard to fault, but the question remains: would the story have more relevance, re-positioned in time to more or less the current day (like, say, The Dark Knight)?

The heavy weight of expectation on this movie was such that the end result could never live up to it. Ultimately the greatest adaptation of Watchmen is the one each and every reader, comic in hand, envisions in their own mind.

Nevertheless, Snyder and his team have tried – and if they have fallen short of glory, it’s not for lack of trying.

There are so many great scenes from the comic that are realised so well, I was compelled to punch the air at least once – which is more than can be said for the likes of From Hell or LXG.

Like Dark Knight, this is muscular, tough stuff (the comic’s gorier elements transferred intact), but Watchmen doesn’t quite scale the same heights.
Score: 7.5/10

Review: Gran Torino

Gran Torino is quite a different beast to Clint Eastwood’s riveting Oscar-bait Changeling, but is as enjoyable, challenging and relevant – and marks the Man With No Name out as simply the best US director currently working, his ability to move between genres unmatched.

Critical shorthand dictates that GT is Dirty Harry redeemed – and breaking the story down to its pure basics, that’s true, but it’s so much more than that. That summary doesn’t reveal the humour, the love of life, the tragedy that Clint allows the film to revel in.

Briefly, Clint is Walt Kowalski, a recently widowed Korean war vet, having to come to terms, Victor Meldrew-style, with a world changing so fast around him that he simply can’t comprehend, can’t make the imaginative leap that good prevails over change; his first and last resort is bitter retrenchment.

And from that, again Victor Meldrew-style, comes the comedy, which no doubt has helped the film’s word of mouth in the US. Every time you think Clint’s verging on ham, the script turns and forces him to default to his game face: he may be 78, but when he’s aiming an M1 rifle at you, you know he knows how to use it.

You see, Walt is old school – he is as racist as that relation you don’t like talking to at family gatherings because of their outdated views. Making things worse for him are his neighbours: Hmongs, the Koreans who helped the US in the war it should be noted, but to Walt they are just the old enemy.

Of course, the inevitable culture clash is bridged by the common enemy – the local gang. Which is not to say that the film demonises gang culture – it’s comedic unravelling of older male relationships clearly draws parallels between the bravado of the gangs (whatever their colour or creed) and the unspoken bond between vets and their own coded language.

The tragedy of the collected bravado sets in relatively late in the piece – and if it strikes a discordant note, I’m tempted to say that Clint’s just being realistic. And the hints are there that the key change, the shift in tone is coming.

Much of the symbolism is hard to discuss without giving away the story, but suffice to say it’s not overplayed.

The supporting cast are uniformly excellent – and the Gran Torino itself is gorgeous.

Tom Stern, who performed such a beautiful job lensing Changeling, does another knock-out job here, while Kyle Eastwood reveals a talent for haunting scores very much in his father’s style.

Ultimately what sets GT apart is simply how enjoyable and spry it is – one suspects its lightness of touch will render it endlessly watchable. It was Stanley Kubrick who mused that the most effective easy to get a serious message across to an audience is through comedy – when you’re laughing, you’re guard is down and, QED, your mind is more receptive.

If this does turn out to be Clint’s final hurrah in front of the camera, then a more fitting epitaph I can’t imagine. Hey, it even includes him singing…
Score: 9/10

Review: The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button

It’s easy to see how Button lost the fight against Slumdog in the end of year reviews and awards ceremonies – alongside Danny Boyle’s bravura flash and feelgood punch, this stately, contemplative storytelling reminds viewers of the past rather than the speed of change in the developing world and what that means for the future and has a slow burn effect that takes longer to sink in.

And that’s what impressed me – this is David Fincher all grown up, as strongly hinted at in his previous effort Zodiac. The flash, the look-what-I-can-do with-the-camera trick shots are entirely absent in Button, Hitchcock references are kept to the bare minimum.

As you well know by now, this is the story of a man born old who dies young – experience is wasted on the young, youth is wasted on the experienced, etc. While it is framed as a conventional tragic romance, the subtext chills this writer to the bone, fearful to a ridiculous degree as I am of physical and mental infirmity: Button of course rather than experience both together at the end of his life experiences them separately at the start and at the end of his life respectively.

Born ironically on the wave of euphoria at the end of the Great War, from the beginning we know we are watching Button’s slow, agonising march to death. The story – and Fincher’s stately pacing – draws out the pain and joy of Button’s life and experiences like a long blade on a sharpening stone. The emotional pull is strong, but reigned in – this is Fincher after all – the emotional jolts are not served up as jabs or punches but aching, slow, burning cuts that require longer recovery.

Brad Pitt, effects n all, is effortlessly subtle, achieving a level previously unhinted at, while Cate Blanchett, cruelly overlooked in the gongs, is of course pure class (and, my lord, those legs!) as the love, quite literally of Button’s life.

Supporting turns are top-notch performances from the likes of Tilda Swinton, who seemingly can’t put a foot wrong these days, and Julia Ormond, who continues her stunning comeback.

Oh, there are criticisms – it is slow throughout, no doubt. And both the symbolism of the humming bird and the hokey effect that produces it are not what one would expect from Fincher. But neither is the assured, confident, adult touch behind the camera, his desire to show off absent as he simply serves the story.

Some have the made the assumption that this is another Forrest Gump – and that’s understandable given that it’s written by the same author and features a similar high concept. With Gump, Button shares an innocent simplicity, an unwavering faith that people will reveal the best in themselves (there’s no cynicism here) – but here the hero is no simpleton, he fully grasps the tragedy of life around him, he has desires, and he realises there are burdens that he cannot carry due to the nature of his condition, forcing upon him unexpected extra emotional crosses to bear.

This is a work of some emotional weight (there’s a genuine rawness to the scenes between Ormond and the ageing Blanchett) and therefore it will live longer in the memory than Slumdog. The greatest compliment that I can pay this movie – and Fincher – is that it feels like a Frank Darabont movie.
Score: 8.5/10

And the Oscars went to...

Slumdog beats Button 8-3. And Mickey Rourke doesn't win!

Best Picture
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Director
Danny Boyle - Slumdog Millionaire

Best Actor
Sean Penn - Milk

Best Actress
Kate Winslet - The Reader

Best Supporting Actress
Penelope Cruz - Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Best Supporting Actor
Heath Ledger - The Dark Knight

Best Foreign Film
Departures

Best Animated Feature Film
Wall-E

Best Adapted Screenplay
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Original Screenplay
Milk

Best Original Score
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Original Song
Jai Ho - Slumdog Millionaire

Art Direction
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Cinematography
Slumdog Millionaire

Costume Design
The Duchess

Film Editing
Slumdog Millionaire

Make-up
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Sound Editing
The Dark Knight

Sound Mixing
Slumdog Millionaire

Visual Effects
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Review: Rachel Getting Married

The second half of my Valentine’s double bill was Rachel Getting Married, which I found more affecting and less acidic than I’d imagined. To date most discussion of this movie has focused on the performance of Anne Hathaway – and understandably so, but that does diminish some excellent work from the other key players.

Hathaway is great as Kym Buckman, all nerves and bile, the recovering junkie, fresh out of rehab returning to the family home in time for her titular sister’s wedding. Weddings are emotionally-charged affairs at the best of times, but especially this one as it takes place at the parental home. Throw in Hathaway’s dynamite Kym, and opening of wounds and heated debate of the family’s dysfunction – and the shocking cause of Kym’s need for rehab – surely follows.

Of course she particularly puts her sister Rachel (played understatedly by Rosemarie DeWitt) and her well-meaning but long-suffering father Paul (Bill Irwin) through the mill. The biggest shock of all is the confrontation between Kym and her mother, (Debra Winger, characteristically assured as the distant and estranged Abby).

Kym is by far the most fleshed out character, our understanding and sympathy towards her helped by seeing her at AA meetings.

While this is dark cinema (shot handheld from an improvised script, quite Dogme-style), the characters do wear all their emotions (good and bad) on their sleeves, making the movie something of an emotional rollercoaster. Nevertheless, the final scene is not as downbeat as might have been expected.

If it turns out that this is director Jonathan Demme’s final fictional movie, it will serve as a fine testimony to his eclectic, indie tastes.
Score: 8/10