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American Star (2024)
Ian McShane hits the spot with a slow burner
This is a good film. Don't listen to the inexperienced voters who think action movies all need to be Tom Cruise overdoing it to prove his youth, or Jason Stratham just over doing it. Again.
This has the nuance and emotion tucked away in it. It's subtle, a slower burn, and Ian McShane is the man for the job. Many other actors would have failed to make this film work. He does. There is plenty enough meat in it, there's a build up to it. And the viewer is not given every emotion in an obvious way through unnecessary dialogue for the hard of feeling. This is a film that old army guys, or wisened fighters might get. The young pups, probably won't, and that is why it has low ratings and deserves a lot better. Though I did keep thinking about the Sexy Beast movie, not because this film is like it, and yet, it's got the Spain (Canary Islands) ex-pat vibe, it's got Ian McShane as a tough old b'stard, and it's in the same genre.
I liked the directors approaches, I liked the camera work, I liked the shots. I holidayed in the Canaries and though I didn't leave the hotel when I stayed in Fuertenventura, I felt this film carried the vibe of the place well enough.
I think this director is going to be getting better as he goes on. He'd be good for a Cormac McCarthy story. I haven't seen Gonzalo López-Gallego's other films but will be checking them out now.
If there is anything I would improve it would be the very last shot, just before the credits. I'd have spent a bit more time getting that to express whatever I felt he was trying to express there. But that doesnt detract from the film or what it does, presents, and conveys.
I am going to give it 10 out of 10 because the low voters need serving, though strictly speaking this is an 8 out of 10 for me.
The Killer (2023)
You know that some people can't stand The Smiths, right?
I expected more from the duo who brought us Seven (Script: Andrew Kevin Walker, Director: David Fincher)
I have some major gripes with the music, but the rest is just the fact this film never got me going. It felt annoyingly lack-lustre, and I cannot work out exactly why yet, since it also could have been a damn good crime action movie. But for me it failed, here is why...
It was a BIG mistake to assume some of us do not find The Smiths and Morrisey absolutely nauseating and wish he had stayed in the 80s. To then use The Smiths entire back catalog at every opportunity was stupid - what were you thinking?
To make that worse, they cut the songs constantly. I noticed this approach happening in a few films recently, but it's distracting to use famous music tracks we are already heavily invested in emotionally. That means it is often not going to jive with the emotion you are trying to present on a screen. I suggest film makers stop doing that.
I also found some of Trent Reznors "stretched goth" sounds to be over done, and started listening to the soundtrack "wishing it would stop making that noise", when I wanted to be watching the film.
So to the plot (no spoilers)...
It was boring. I mean it had good bits; it was a slow burn, the story was good, the acting acceptable, but the narrated monologue was monotonous. The opening scene was the only place it worked, and even that went on way too long.
What has happened to Fassbender? He was gym bro'd up in Assassins Creed, but here he looked like a tired, anorexic, yoga weasel. Again, that was distracting. But I ignored it. I like him. He is good in this, but somehow... not sure what. Its missing something. I just couldnt get with his part for some reason. The entire film felt like it was trying to be a Brett Easton Ellis story. Something just wasnt right.
I probably went into it with too much expectation, but with dross like the Marvels and relentless dirth from AppleTV et al, we - the viewer - need saving. The old guard seem to want to use tired approaches, and I can't help but feel it needs braver directors to come up with something less "off the shelf" now. We need a remedy.
I didn't leave the movie feeling satisfied, I left it feeling that maybe there is no hope for original action movies any longer. I look forward to someone proving me wrong.
I will watch it again another time, to see if this was me being moody or genuine issues with the film. I suspect the latter to be honest.
Its an okay film, but it should have been better and I will now look at the other reviews to see if anyone else figured out quite why that is.
The King (2019)
This film is at its most masterful in the moments of silence
A great film. Absolutely fantastic. A showcase for great directing and a showcase for great acting.
David Michôd - intentionally or not - creates a Denis Villeneuve feel in the directing of this film. Something I love and I wish more would emulate or expand on.
It is a slow, calm, burn, and a brilliant use of subtle tension created by moments of silence between serious men. Something that must be challenging to risk doing in this era of endless public demand for overdone CGI, shakey fight sequences, frivolous narrative pushing, and talking racoons saving the universe.
It is also excellently acted, and the first time I noticed that Timothée Chalamet, for all his petite size, has a hell of a presence when he taps into it. I later confirmed this with his part in Dune. Since watching "The King" I have now noticed him in other films where previously I hadn't.
Joel Edgerton fits his role perfectly and plays it well, and even Robert Pattinson who I normally cannot abide, is fantastic in the role of the insipid and smoulderingly aggressive french Dauphin. So very him.
Sean Harris also stands as one of the four pillars of this film. Presenting as a classic Englishman who has been through one King and knows the ropes, he is tired, he is old, and really just wants to retire leaving a legacy he can feel proud of, and yet he is capable of surprising us unexpectedly in the best, or maybe the worst, of ways.
Ben Mendlesohn isnt really in it long enough to do more than set the film in motion, but when isnt he great in a role?
I loved this film. Everything about it. It stirred my manly sense of self, and made me want to put on chain mail and go fight for England. It also highlighted the emotional connection between men of strength capable of violence, that so few seem to be aware of.
More battles should take place in mud, filmed without jiggy camera movement, and be presented in the way the field of Agincourt was in this one. Intimate violence, filmed in full, and incredibly engaging throughout.
To say anything more would introduce spoilers, but if you havent watched it, save it for a rainy Sunday afternoon where you are slowed down enough to appreciate a good film, at a realistic pace, a convincing film, and with not a single talking racoon in sight.
Top marks, and a well-deserved standing ovation from me.
Les trois mousquetaires: D'Artagnan (2023)
never, never, never...
... end a two-hour movie part way through a crucial scene with "to be continued..."
It was okay as a movie, though it dragged in the second half. I was willing to give it kudos because the story is French so the French should know how to present it. So, I was holding high hopes going in, and many scenes are environmentally excellent. The French really knew how to do palaces and period clothing.
We had some good actors, and some acceptable actors. Thankfully we had no bad actors. We had that dude who is in every French film every made playing Athos (Vincent Cassel). We had Eva Green who was in my opinion a terrible choice for what should be a much darker character. Faye Dunaway was excellent in the old English version (which itself has not aged at all well, sadly), though maybe I am biased and this is how the French saw their Milady De Winter. The role itself is one of my favourite for a sinister woman who betrays everyone.
The D'Artagnan character is solid and he played it well, didn't over play it. But the other two seemed weak for the role. One looked like a rat dandy, the other was somewhat bland. Are they famous french actors? I presume so, maybe I need to give them time to grow on me. In which case, I might think otherwise when we eventually get to see the entire story.
I liked the king, he played it well, but I also it felt that goofy character had been done elsewhere, and I had the feeling the director was lifting the character, but from whence I cannot yet recall? It will come to me, but like the film this can remain unfinished...
This two hour - let's call it "episode" - appeared to be part one. I am guessing they will go for three parts. I wish I had known before I started watching, as I would not have bothered, waiting instead until I could watch the thing in it's entirety.
There are also some liberal adjustements made to the original story line. Maybe this is a good idea; to challenge the viewer because it is such a classic and well known script otherwise. But I found that to be annoying. I wanted the classic story of the three musketeers, not a doctored version of it. Maybe that was just me, but I found it half-hearted and smacked of cowardice. Either do a new story, or do the old properly, don't meander between the two, it feels insulting when the original is so brilliant and perfect.
In 2023, I believe it is all about courtesy to the viewer. We are demanding, because we can afford to be. There is much choice out there, and a lot of it is lacking and bodged together. So it is important to get it right, and you will be remembered for it. The opposite is also true. Do well and we will shower you with accolades, make basic mistakes, and you will hear about it.
When you finish the movie, I will finish the review. You'll get your stars then. Until then, learn an important lesson: provide proper closure, regardless of whether it is "to be continued".
... to be continued.
War of the Worlds: The Attack (2023)
a diabolical travesty
They took a famously good story, and turned it into a trashy, teenager-themed, travesty of script destruction. Nothing about this movie is any good. It is cheap, obviously immature, and tiresome.
The CGI is tacky for 2023, the child actors are gleefully annoying, the scenes are done in a local park with a smoke machine and bad lighting, or mum's house round the kitchen table. The rest is a green screen. The extras seem like they were picked at random from a bus stop near Elephant and Castle.
There is nothing good I can say about this movie, because we have so many examples of it being done better elsewhere, so much better. Whoever butchered the original script into such a boring diatribe of nonsense should seek employment in another industry, pronto.
This movie is unwatchable and indicative of the cheap rubbish that is being spewed out these days. In that, it excels. I'd give it less than 1 if I could, because I would like to reverse time and never have watched any of it.