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Monday 24 February 2014

New Release Review: 'Her'


How quickly you get onboard Spike Jonze's Her depends on how bearable/cutesy you find the name Theodore Twombly (played by the ever-awkward Joaquin Phoenix) and how effective/thematically-pointed you find his job. The year is 2025 but feels like 2015, if Apple were allowed to design the world for a year. Theodore is about to be newly divorced, has a circle of friends so small that it's more of a triangle, and compounds his relative isolation by spending his days writing love letters for the emotionally tongue-tied; neatly keeping himself from dealing with his own stunted emotions. Doubling down on his hermetic life Theodore buys the latest OS ('operating system'), which comes with an enticing new feature: artificial intelligence. His OS chooses the name Samantha (and is voiced with surprising range and depth by the often one-note Scarlett Johansson). Samantha is funny, sharp, and (not surprising given the casting) rather sexy. But ultimately she's a disembodied voice constrained by the small (and of course immaculately designed) box that contains her being. A modern day genie in a bottle.

Thanks to some deft writing and great performances the film skips past a lot of problematic questions about what Samantha is. Theodore likes her, trusts her, perhaps even loves her, but the moment you think of what she is, Theodore's very own genie, personally created for him based on his answers to a handful of questions (such as the always reliable 'What's your relationship like with your mother'), the whole dynamic seems even more warped than it already is. Part of that is intentional. Samantha literally belongs to Theodore. He owns her. How many people have said the same of their other halfs? (Even if they didn't mean it quite as literally as Theodore.) There are other knowing relationship parallels, such as Samantha's emotional growth and evolution beginning to outstrip Theodore's. Later in the film, in one perfectly written scene which echoes so many break-ups, Theodore asks if she's talking to anyone else (rather than the usual enquiry of whether she's sleeping with anyone else), and the answer feels painfully true despite its science fiction twist.

Jonze recently said that Her isn't about our relationship with technology, it just uses technology to find a new way to explore relationships. Which rather fudges the truth. There are one too many cut aways of crowds flowing past Theodore, talking on their phones or just scanning them, keeping themselves apart. Isolated. No one looks 'connected'; they look alone. By falling for an operating system is Theodore the same, or is his relationship real? Jonze toys with the question but ultimately takes any choice out of Theodore's hands. Possibly because even he doesn't know.

Making the whole thing go down with more ease than it probably ought is Hoyte van Hoytema's beautiful cinematography. The film pops with bright bold colours, reds, yellows, oranges, evocative of late summer (or perhaps just of iPhone ads). Which goes some way to selling this not quite future.

Her isn't as unique as its premise initially seems (Ruby Sparks plays with similar ideas and is well worth hunting down), but it is surprisingly touching. With a clearer voice it might have ranked alongside Jonze's best. Instead it's just very very good.

Overall: 8/10

Monday 17 February 2014

New Release Review: 'The Lego Movie'

Chris Pratt Will Ferrell Phil Lord Christopher Miller Lego Movie

'The Lego Movie' is a rather bland and generic title. Bland titles are usually a cause for worry; titles that end in 'Movie', even more so (see: Epic Movie, Disaster Movie and Scary Movie. Or, y'know, don't). Fortunately The Lego Movie comes from the minds of Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who were responsible for the brilliantly demented Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.

The plot of The Lego Movie could easily be described as that of The Matrix because, well... It is. Except with a lego Neo, and rather more boundless joy. We follow Emmet (our Neo), a regular (lego) guy, working as a construction worker amongst thousands of others, all of whom follow the meticulous design plans laid down by Lord Business (essentially The Architect from The Matrix Reloaded). In Lord Business's world there is no creativity or choice. Everything must be built exactly as the instructions dictate. But there is a prophecy, about a 'piece of resistance', and a master builder who'll wield it and free the world. After happening upon the 'piece' it looks like Emmet might just be the (lego) man his world needs.

From this unlikely springboard we get one scene after another of beautiful chaos. There's so much happening in the foreground, background and, well, the middleground, that even the animators of the sight-gag heavy Aardman films would struggle to catch it all in one viewing. And once you realise the pair had the audacity to remake The Matrix as lego, only with added fun, you're distracted on a whole other level as you start seeing parallels everywhere: Good Cop/Bad Cop is Agent Smith, Wildstyle is Trinity, Vitruvius is both Morpheus and The Oracle, and Batman is... Um... Cypher? Or is he just Batman? But then who's Uni-Kitty? Is she The Oracle? What about Pirate Metalbeard? It's possible I'm overthinking this.

The reservations I have about the film are slight: the visuals are, at times, too chaotic (the exact opposite of the altogether too empty backgrounds in Frozen), something which probably couldn't be helped when making a film set in a world made up of little bricks; the film's central message is laid on rather thick, but it's a good message all the same; and finally, although it's funny and engaging, and you somehow end up rooting for little yellow toys that waddle divertingly, there are a couple of moments in the film where you wander if it isn't all just a very shiny surface.

In summary: someone remade The Matrix via a toyline, and somehow it's rather good.


Overall: 7.5/10

Monday 3 February 2014

New Release Review: 'Lone Survivor'

Peter Berg Mark Wahleberg
Lone Survivor, a title so generic and forgettable that I can barely keep it in mind even whilst typing it, is based on the book of the same name: a true account of a Navy SEALs mission gone awfully awry. SEAL Team 10 go into Afghanistan to take out a Taliban leader, but the mission's compromised when a goat herder and his sons stumble across them; one of the few noteworthy moments in a film more interested in the immaculate recreation of a firefight than in dealing with difficult moral questions. Not long after this the team find themselves surrounded by a 50-strong contingent of Taliban fighters. Which is when the film Peter Berg really wanted to make begins; and it turns out that film is Assault on Precinct 13. The team of four, Marcus (Mark Wahlberg), Mikey (Taylor Kitsch), Danny (Emile Hirsch), and Matt (Ben Forster), are beset on all sides. Shots fly, RPGs are launched, and shrapnel goes everywhere. It's intense, disorientating, and probably not far from the truth of what happened that day. Several times the team comment on the astonishing speed of the horde: they're fast. Impossibly fast. Another (likely unintended) nod to Precinct 13. And that's the trouble. Is it a stylish action-thriller, in line with Berg's underrated The Kingdom, or is it a brutal realistic account of a terrible day (see: anything by Greengrass)? Berg goes back and forth between the two approaches, but never settles.

Even if the film weren't tonally confused, it still barely qualifies as a story. Instead it feels like a detailed recreation for a news segment. There's no reason the event can't be moving and compelling, but Berg does nothing to justify the film's existence. The SEAL team are so devoid of defining characteristics you wonder how they tell each other apart behind their thick beards. That the survivor of the title is the least fleshed out of the team is especially odd. The group have an easy manner with each other, highlighted by some passable banter, but they're each defined by a single characteristic or, if they're really unlucky, a single fact. One is engaged, another is married, the third one is competitive, and the fourth is... Well... His beard is rather straggly. Maybe he feels less secure around the more manly beards? There's more character work done in that sentence then the script does for any of the team during the entire running time. It's not until the closing act, when a small village intercedes and attempts to offer protection to our titular survivor - this despite the fact that it would mean their annihilation by the Taliban - that the film wakes up. Suddenly interesting questions are posed and deeper themes are intimated; but it's too little too late.

At the very beginning of the film there's a montage of real footage of men going through the gruelling training regime to become a Navy SEAL. Most who watch it will quickly realise they probably aren't amongst the 0.01% who are cut out to be a SEAL. Berg's film seems to exist purely to confirm that. SEAL Team 10 take bullet after bullet and keep moving. They take falls that would leave most human bodies in pieces, then get up again. Lone Survivor shows you how much hurt a body can take; but it doesn't show you much else.

Overall: 5.5/10

Random side note:
This does answer one of the greatest mysteries in film. (Okay, that might be slightly hyperbolic, but only slightly.) The mystery: why would Berg direct Battleship? Dear god why!? He's hardly a highbrow director, but even his weakest films have some intellect. Battleship has aliens, Rihanna, a complete lack of anyone saying "You sunk my Battleship!" (which is unforgivable), and a dearth of intellect. So why do it? Turns out it was a bargain. Universal would only give him the cash for his latest, Lone Survivor, if he made their little film first. Not a great bargain.