Mudbound (Netflix Originals) - review

2017 was quite the year for Netflix. Not only was it the year that it broke through with its original film programming, it was the year I finally discovered that "Netflix and Chill" was not just about watching movies on the sofa!
They had quality genre hits such as The Babysitter and the excellent Gerald's Game that caused several people, including me, to do this...

But 2017 was the year that Netflix decided that they wanted to compete with the big boys and be taken seriously. Could they do it? "Yes we Cannes!" and Netflix went to France to compete in the Cannes Film Festival with Book Jong-Ho's Okja and Noah Baumbach's The Meyerowitz Stories.
Did it go as planned? Not quite. The French in particular were against the idea of films playing in competition that would not receive a cinematic release, head judge Pedro Almodovar said that the films would never win a prize and the controversy overshadowed two good films and a very rare thing... a great Adam Sandler performance.
Netflix decided they were not going to let that stop them and have doubled down on their original programming; organising a deal with Curzon for limited runs of the films to appear on their screens, financing $100 million for Martin Scorsese's The Irishman starring DeNiro, Pacino and Pesci and now they have gone legit are entered the Oscar race with Mudbound.
Amazon Studios were the first to the podium last year with Manchester By The Sea but Mudbound is the sole streaming film in the race this year and received 4 Oscar nominations for Best Supporting Actress, Best Song, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Cinematography.
The cinematography nomination is well deserved, and history making as Rachel Morrison became the first female cinematographer to be ever receive one. The film looks stunning and every shot captures the feeling of the Deep South in Forties America.
Mudbound tells the story of two families, the Macallan's and the Jackson's. Linked by land, the film explores their relationships defined by race, class and the fall out of WWII with both families giving their men to the war but find they are treated differently upon their return.
Performances across the board are as strong as the liquor and tensions that brewed in Mississippi, with particular standouts being Garret Hedlund, Jason Mitchell and Jonathan Banks as the deeply racist Pappy.
The film really comes into its own once the war is over and it explores the friendship between Hedlund's Jamie and Mitchell's Ronzell, which will ultimately come to define both families.
The main issue with the storytelling is the decision of director Dee Rees and screenwriter Virgil Williams is the over-reliance on voice-over narration.
Given it is adapted from a novel and this was the structure of the book, it is understandable however as Robert McKee in Adaptation would scream "...and God help you if you use voice-over in your work, my friends. God help you. That's flaccid, sloppy writing. Any idiot can write a voice-over narration to explain the thoughts of a character."
So not only does the audience get one voice-over, it gets six different characters narrating their own parts of the story and at times, the narrative becomes as clear as mud.
Thankfully the narration does not overshadow the performances and the result is a film that shows that if the commissioning team at Netflix continue to fund films and stories like this, they are Bound for glory.

3 stars

Inside Llewyn Davis - review

It's been six years since the Coen Brothers topped the charts with No Country For Old Men. Since then they have failed to recapture that magic.

Burn After Reading split opinion. A Serious Man alienated and confused the casual fans and a cover version of country hit True Grit had commercial success even if some of the lyrics were difficult to understand.

However the Coens are back to their best with an ode to the folk music scene of Sixties Greenwich Village.

Recruiting Llewyn Davis for lead vocals was an interesting choice. Originally part of a successful double act, one might worry he couldn't handle the pressure of carrying the show but his voice has a rawness and melancholy that draws the listener in.

His songs tell a story of the pressures of conformity, the price of fame and the journey one takes to truly find themselves and their place within the music scene.

One fears that Llewyn might be trapped in an ever repeating circle of failure and obscurity but this album will stand the test of time and he'll be remembered as an artist who deserved greater success (Oscar, I'm looking at you).

Davis was part of a scene that was rich with unique characters. Some producers might question the need for all these quirky character collaborations throughout the album but that is what the Coens do so well and they leave their stamp on the production that you can instantly tell who made it.

Stand out tracks include:

Please Mr. Kennedy by Jim, Llewyn Davis & Al Cody

"Where's his scrotum?!" by Lillian & Ulysses the Cat

Chicago Road Trip by Llewyn featuring Roland Turner, Johnny Five & Ulysses

Inside Llewyn Davis, like the album of said name, might not be to everyone's taste but those who appreciate its quirks and charms will find a 4 star album filled with the odd 5 star song destined to be on repeat for many years to come.

4 stars

Shame - review

Brandon is a handsome thirtysomething working in New York in an unspecified job with a fancy apartment.  On the outside it seems he has everything, but in fact it is all a mask that he projects to cover up some deep seeded issues.

From that brief description you could say that Brandon has a lot in common with another cinematic/literary character... Patrick Bateman.
In American Psycho, Bateman mask of sanity covered up psychotic tendencies and the film/book was a vicious attack on the materialism of the Eighties.
Shame's protaganist Brandon's obsession though isn't murder but sex.  Which if recent reports and television shows are to be believed is becoming an increasingly common, serious and relevant addiction.
Whether it is hiring escorts, a one night stand, online sex forums, magazines, dvds or downloading gigabytes of pornography onto his office computer or masturbating in the shower, Brandon does everything to keep his sexual urges at bay. 
However the carefully constructed wall he has built up to shield himself from any form of outside connection comes tumbling down with the unexpected arrival of his sister Sissy, who has her own set of problems.
Steve McQueen (not that one) has crafted a truly haunting piece of cinema that holds a mirror up to Brandon (and in some respects the audience).  It is an incredibly beautiful film to look at, (his shot construction and framing is impeccable, whether it is a tracking shot following Brandon jogging along 31st Street or an unmoving camera capturing an argument that suddenly exposes a tear on Sissy's face), but there is also a coldness and detachment to it that never allows the sexual imagery to become erotic or titillating.  It provides us with no feeling of joy in the same way that Brandon can never achieve, no matter how hard and consistently he tries.

Fassbender bares all as Brandon (both metaphorically and literally) and it would be fair to say that from the evidence of the opening scene, Michael certainly has nothing to be, ahem, ashamed of.  He plays it very internalised to begin with, as Christopher Walken says in True Romance "a game of show and tell.  You don't want to show me nothing but you're telling me everything", but as cracks appear in his mask we get a tear here, a violent outburst there, until his whole world unravels during a flashback sequence over the night's events.
Sure it might not have those grand-standing, scenery chewing moments that Oscar loves so much but it is certainly the most compelling, bravest performance of the year.

Fassbender's acting is elevated by having the sublime Carey Mulligan to bounce off.  I think it is fair to say that when we are first introduced to Sissy, Carey has come a long way from Sally Sparrow in Blink (still my all time favourite Doctor Who episode).  From their initial encounter when Brandon finds Sissy in his apartment, it is clear this is not your normal brother/sister relationship.  There is a troubled history between them but McQueen and screenwriter Abi Morgan wisely leave the details up to the audience's imagination.
Like recent sports dramas The Fighter and Warrior, Shame manages to transcend its genre origins to become more than just "the sex addiction movie" by having a gripping family drama at its core.
Sissy is the yin to Brandon's yang (and the win to his wang).  Where Brandon is a very internal person, Sissy wears her emotions on her sleeve.  She is a poster girl for the neurotic, needy and vunerable, perfectly illustrated by her long haunting rendition of New York, New York in a trendy bar.
At one point Brandon attempts to have a normal relationship with a woman at his work but via an uncomfortable dinner date and hotel tryst, it is doomed to fail.  Brandon's redemption however may in fact lie in repairing his relationship with Sissy, but is he too far down the path to self destruction?
Shame is not a film that seeks to provide the audience with any easy answers.  It is a challenging, thought provoking and stunning piece of cinema that will haunt you for days and will require multiple orgasms viewings, and there is certainly no shame in that!
5 stars

Drive - review

Drive premiered at the Cannes Film Festival back in May where it was met with near universal acclaim and won the Best Director award for Nicolas Winding Refn. Since then it has been touted by many critics as their "Film Of The Year".
I always worry when films receive such a high volume of praise, because it is then difficult for them to live up to such lofty expectations (The Guard springs to mind here)... but I am delighted to inform you that Drive is one of those rare occasions where you can believe the hype. It is quite possibly the film of the year and definitely the coolest, leaving all other contenders in its dust.
Originally planned to be in the same vein as Fast & Furious, thankfully when Gosling and Refn came on board they decided not to betray the source material's pulp fiction roots and have crafted a thriller that is lean, mean, fast and as cool as a (insert appropriate car here).
Man crush of the moment Ryan Gosling is the unnamed Driver of the film. Whether it is doing stunts for movies, acting as a getaway driver or just driving around at night, that he who he is. No more, no less. His character can be likened to The Man With No Name in the Leone films. It is a very underplayed performance by Gosling, he has minimal dialogue, preferring to let his face and body language tell the story, and his grey satin jacket with a scorpion motif will be as iconic as Eastwood's hat and poncho. You can imagine him arriving town, taking down a score or helping a damsel in distress before riding off into the sunset, but in this case he doesn't use a horse but a Dodge Cavalier instead.
I think it was Godard who said "all you need to tell a story is a girl and a gun" and this is true for Drive... if you substitute "gun" for "claw hammer", fast becoming 2011's weapon of choice (see also Kill List, ).
Suffice to say our driver gets mixed up with a pretty girl (Carey Mulligan) and his quiet, controlled life quickly spins out of control and the road to revenge is peppered with pitstops of extreme violence. Is that enough driving puns?
Refn fully deserves the praise coming his way and his shiny award from Cannes. There is not a single moment of the film where he is not in complete control of what is one screen. He draws great performances out of his actors (Albert Brooks proving that sometimes comedians can do menacing better than the rest), knows that a lingering look between Gosling and Mulligan says more than any dialogue could, when to hold a shot and when to cut away, and as exemplified on BBC Breakfast, he knows that building to these sudden bursts of violence is very important, the lift scene a prime example. Backed up with stunning cinematography that gives Los Angeles a sheen that it hasn't had since Collateral and a terrific electronic soundtrack by Cliff Martinez that is destined to be downloaded by moviegoers straight after the film, Refn looks to be the complete filmmaker and I for one am very excited about his future prospects.
So grab your toothpick, sit down and fasten your seat belts because it's going to be one bumpy, but sizzlingly cool, night at the Drive-In for, yes I'm saying it too, The Film Of The Year.

5 stars