Tag: movie review

MOVIE REVIEW: A Problem with Prequels; how ‘Wonka’ plays it safe

There’s a trend in the Hollywood that has been going on for decades now; focusing on prequels of villains and attempting to give them nuance. There’s Angelina Jolie’s turn as ‘Maleficent,’ it reimagines the story as if it were told incorrectly. Or like Emma Stone’s turn as ‘Cruella,’ who does not shy away from her evil tendencies but paints her as an anti-hero to an even more nefarious enemy in that story. Just recently, ‘The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ presents us with the origin story of President Snow, the main antagonist of ‘The Hunger Games’ trilogy. While it does not shy away from his deeds, it does try to paint him as a sympathetic character.

While Willy Wonka from Roald Dahl’s book ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,’ is not necessarily evil, there is a sinister flair to him. I’m more familiar with the 1971 movie ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’ directed by Mel Stuart and starred Gene Wilder. Willy Wonka is an eccentric, to put it mildly. Children have been hurt or even perished in his factory on the day of the visit and he remains emotionally unaffected by these – as if the children’s weaknesses and moral failings made them deserving of such punishment.

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It’s this characterisation of the title character – which I was told, that sinister quality, is taken to the extreme in th 2005 movie adaptation by Tim Burton with Johnny Depp – that creates a disconnect with the newly released prequel ‘Wonka’ directed by Paul King and starring Timothee Chalamet. Whereas all previous materials on Willy Wonka creates a dark and mysterious character, Chalamet’s ‘Wonka’ is very light-hearted and friendly. There is a touch of whimsy on all versions but while the Wonka of ‘Wonka’ leans towards the cutesy and relatable, all other versions are shifting closer towards dark or sinister.

There is nothing about Willy Wonka in ‘Wonka’ that even closely hints at the person he will become in ‘Charlie and the Cholate Factory’ or any of its movie adaptations. And that becomes emblematic of this growing trend. In order to milk any franchise or IP of its monetary value, they will extend any character’s narrative, both for prequels and sequels with the hopes that the familiarity of the character would ensure box office success. Throw in a huge star into the mix and they are hoping for a healthy returns in ticket sales.

What this does, though, is that it removes the mystery from that of the audience. A lot of the magic of these narratives – especially from the dark, twisted minds of a children’s book author like Roald Dahl – comes from the stories that don’t make it to the books. What caused Willy Wonka to become the eccentric, anti-social chocolatier that he is, who doesn’t mind punishing children in severe ways for having the worst qualities of being a child.

It is the parts that are not shown and not talked about that activates the imagination, that allows us to wonder and dream. But an exercise like ‘Wonka’ or any of the other films I mentioned at the start of this critique is not interested in wonder or mystery. They want everything explained because it is what they think the audience wants, and so it will sell.

So ‘Wonka’ is about how Willy Wonka got his start in the chocolate business. From the onset, he’s already whimsical and flighty as a character. He already also has magic – though unexplained – and instead it becomes a story about how he beats a chocolate monopoly run by a cartel. It’s about breaking oppressive systems by being just as sneaky – bending the rules because those in power don’t play fair. It sets itself as an underdog story complete with an orphan girl, Noodle (played by Calah Lane) and ragtag of other people were cheated out of their freedom by a sinister proprietress of a bed and breakfast (played by Olivia Colman).

© 2023 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved

Like any material based on a Roald Dahl book, the villains are dastardly and cruel, and they don’t play fair. But without any real struggle, Willy Wonka and his ragtag band of misfits go toe to toe with both Colman’s Mrs Scrubbs and the chocolate cartel. What adds to the disconnect of the whole story on Willy Wonka is that this is a musical with only one really good, proper song. There’s even a song that attempts to rhyme different words with chocolate and instead of coming off as charming, it sounds annoying instead; and other than that, the chocolate is not symbolic of anything other than that of childhood dreams. Wonka is dead set on making it big as a chocolatier because of that connection with his mom but the film fails to create any real connection with the symbol (chocolates and chocolate-making) with the people around him.

The chocolates themselves are just a means to an end. What the film manages to establish is his connection with his band in the same struggles that they share but it has nothing to do with the chocolate itself. For a film as magical and whimsical as this, it would be nice if the chocolate actually meant something other than a setting or any interchangeable McGuffin. ‘Wonka’ is big and loud and wears its heart on its sleeve. It is tailor-made as a movie made for the entire family. It has not set out to tell us anything new nor is it in any danger of upsetting anyone or offending anyone’s sensibilities and as such, it carries very little mystery or wonder or any real sense of magic.

My Rating:

Wonka is now showing. Check screening times and buy tickets here.

December 8, 2023
MOVIE REVIEW: Dystopia, from the eyes of the Everyman: a review of ‘Concrete Utopia’

Headlined by Korean superstars Lee Byung-hun (‘Squid Game,’ ‘Mr. Sunshine’), Park Seo Jun (‘Itaewon Class,’ ‘Dream’), and Park Bo-Young (‘Strong Girl Bongsoon’), the dystopian science fiction film ‘Concrete Utopia’ is a hard-look at civilization at the cold-hard grip of a disaster. It is a 129-minute relentless character study of the human race on survival mode. It is unafraid to get scary, poignant, and surprisingly funny.

Without warning, a massive earthquake ravages the city of Seoul and, in the most fantastical way, only one apartment building has remained untouched after the devastation. This touch of magic elevates the film into the level of a dark fable or a cautionary tale. At the start, the residents of the apartment building has taken in outsiders looking for shelter but as thieving and violence begins to erupt, the residents decide to take control of the space and kick everyone else out. A governing body is then formed and a system is enacted to keep the peace and to ensure the resident’s survival.

We see this through three perspectives: Lee Byung-hun’s Yeong-tak, who becomes the defacto leader when he shows decisive decision-making skills when a fire erupts early on, Park Seo Jun’s Min-sung, a civil servant who feels overwhelmed by the current state of the world, and his wife Myeong-hwa, played by Park Bo-young, who is a nurse and who is desperately clinging on to her humanity as the world gets fiercer and meaner.

Lee Byung-hun is delivering a magnificent performance of an ordinary man who is thrust with so much power. We can literally see his character change as he starts to enjoy the power and adoration he gets from the leadership position he now holds. Lee shows off his magnificent range here and is able to convey his character’s darkest corners with physically transforming on screen when his character starts to get drunk with power.

On the flip-side, Park Bo Young serves as the moral compass of the film. She is witness to the discrimination and bullying that is happening within the system and as much as she wants to fight against it, she’s also feeling alone in a world that has become worse during survival mode.

But while Lee and Park are doing excellent portrayals of these typical characters in such events, it’s Park Seo Jun’s Min-sung that is the most textured and refreshing to see. We’ve seen Park Seo Jun from common and brusque as he was in ‘Midnight Runners’ and ‘Fight for My Way’ and we’ve also seen him in refined and elegant and powerful like in ‘What’s Wrong with Secretary Kim?’ and ‘She Was Beautiful.’ Min-sung is a whole new character for Park, who invokes a sense of the everyman in Min-sung. He is unambitious and unassuming. He wants to be just below the radar and while he is determined to protect his family – Myeong-Hwa – he also doesn’t want to rock the boat too much. It’s a layered performance that isn’t as flashy as Lee Byung-hun but it helps truly sell the film’s premise of a world succumbing to darkness and how people just give in to stay alive.

Boasting of fantastic special effects scenes of the destruction of Seoul, director Um Tae-hwa adeptly balances the larger, more spectacular aspects of his story with the more tender, most intimate moments of the narrative. He easily switches from comic – sometimes even campy – to the deadly serious as the story unfolds and it keeps the movie interesting. After the initial eviction of the non-residents, a scene that is immensely tension-filled and riveting, the film then cuts to a portion much like a corny, AVP that shows life in the apartment building. It’s funny but also scary, when you feel the contrast between the images and the tone of the moment. It’s aspects such a these that keeps the film from falling completely within Western mainstream Hollywood disaster films.

It’s also incredible to see Park Seo Jun, the superstar of so many top Kdramas and movies, play someone so passive, so easily corrupted. He is torn between the seductive pull of Yeong-tak’s credo of survival and the love of his kind-hearted wife Myeong-hwa. Min-sung then becomes the fulcrum by which the film has the most to say.

‘Concrete Utopia’ hits all the necessary narrative beats to stay enjoyable and riveting throughout its rather dark and disturbing look at humanity but it also manages to say what it has to say about our human capacity for caring for others. It’s not subtle at all but it’s well-executed that it’s worth every penny.

My Rating:

Concrete Utopia is now showing in sneak previews at your favorite cinemas on September 11 and 12, one week before the regular release on September 20. Get your tickets and screening times here.

September 12, 2023
Movie Review: Cinemalaya’s Opening Film ‘Marupok AF’ treads dangerous ground

As someone who was completely oblivious to the viral trend back in 2020 that became the basis for the story of ‘Marupok AF,’ I was taken for a wild ride as I watch the Quark Henares-directed film (with a screenplay by Henares and John Bedia). It’s a story of a horrifying catfish scheme directed primarily at transwomen and other members of the LGBTQIA+ community (at the end of the film, even one woman said she was victimized by the real-life perpetrator). It was recounted on Twitter and this formed the film that opened the 19th Cinemalaya Film Festival. ‘Marupok AF’ features much of Quark Henares’ refined, glossy, and hip filmmaking. It includes a terrific cast that includes EJ Jallorina, Maris Racal, Royce Cabrera, and a scene-stealing Gabby Padilla.

But with everything going for it, the film treads on very dangerous ground because while it shows the full range of hurt that can come from a catfish scenario, the film’s takes the tone of a comedy (and sometimes even the conventions of a heist movie) that ends up serving as a buffer to how despicable the act is. In fact, it turns the act of catfishing into a comic situation where the audience are laughing at the trans character, who is victimized by the situation and the young man who is being exploited by the catfisher.

It follows the story of Janzen (Jallorina) who meets Theo (Cabrera) via a dating app. It’s a powerful connection and Janzen finds herself falling in love except that it is quickly revealed that Theo is really Dennis, an aspiring industry professional who accepts the job of pretending to be Theo for Beanie (Maris Racal), who has a thing for catfishing transwomen like Janzen. Strangely enough, Beanie goes to the extreme with Janzen and this forms the crux of the story.

Told in a non-linear manner and through various perspectives, Janzen reveals her innermost thoughts through monologuing live on her social media, facing the camera and relating the story to her followers (the audience). Dennis ends up telling his story via an internet talk show, complete with a host. One of the many tricky areas is that Beanie gets to the talk to the audience directly. Completely unmediated, whether by social media or by a host, Beanie gets to directly talk to the audience and plead her case. In fact, her studio has a bar that she can lean on while talking and it gives her the image of a podium and she gets the most screen time. Racal is devilishly charming. She is so engaging that she takes over the three storylines and it feels like it becomes Beanie’s story.

Henares doesn’t shy away from showing us how Theo’s playing hot and cold is screwing with Janzen’s mind but while the movie does show us Janzen agonizing over it, we also get to see Beanie and her co-conspirator Dina (played deliciously by a scene-stealing Gabby Padilla) enjoying the fruits of their fiendishness. But the film plays it as a comedy and as the film feels more tilted to Beanie, it is Beanie’s triumph that feels highlighted and not Janzen’s pain.

And while this is going on, Dennis is caught between an opportunity (Beanie promised him that she’d help him be an actor and a director) and doing what he can see is a horrible thing to do. He is conflicted but he also needs the money that Beanie offers and the opportunity. So, Dennis is being exploited but he is also a butt of the jokes as his being of the common folk is also used for comedy.

Told in three different perspectives simultaneously, with varying degree of tones (though all are consistently comedic), ‘Marupok AF’ details the the inner workings of an elaborate catfish scheme but with the villain at the center. Rather than be disgusted, you find yourself amused by them (and Racal’s excellent portrayal of Beanie’s confusion as to why she might actually be so invested in taking Janzen down) and, in a way, Beanie is humanized whereas Janzen and Dennis are turned into punchlines.

It’s easy to put the camera on Beanie, she is an interesting character, especially when played by Racal, but to do so at the expense of Janzen and Dennis, both who are played so brilliantly by Jallorina and Cabrera, makes ‘Marupok AF’ a dangerous film. While I’m on my seat squirming and seething with anger at the horrors that Beanie and Dina are putting Janzen through, the crowd around me were laughing, courtesy of Henares’ slick filmmaking, witty dialogue, and hip music (composed by CRWN).

Fortunately, the film ends well (it is a comedy after all) and the final act is given to Jallorina’s Janzen but I feel like I could’ve gotten to know her better throughall of this. As the film tries to create a rally cry of understanding and compassion by its final act, it can feel like a last-minute realisation for having let Racal’s Beanie steal the movie.

With that being said, ‘Marupok AF’ is Quark Henares’ best film. It takes his strengths – directorial finesse and a pulse of what tickles the zeitgeist – and presents a story that is so rooted in the now. It’s best when it allows its characters to just be themselves (and it helps with a cast this good and working at this level) and when he puts the spotlight on Janzen and how society is so mean and cruel to transpeople (there’s a scene involving a bathroom and a vicious bathroom attendant that sends shivers down my spine). I wish the film was more of that than of Beanie.

My Rating:

August 10, 2023
Movie Review: Fantastic Plastic: a review of ‘Barbie’

Who would have thought that the director of such nuanced and meticulous films like ‘Lady Bird’ and ‘Little Women’ would be able to craft such a bombastic film that is fully committed to its absurdity as ‘Barbie.’ Director and screenwriter Greta Gerwig, (with co-screenwriter Noah Baumbach of ‘Marriage Story’) delivers a narrative that never takes itself too seriously, ever, and by doing so manage to break all the rules and expectations set upon as a movie and allows it to go to places both familiar, true, and biting without ever feeling like you are being preached to. Because the politics of the film is part of the joke.

People immediately ask if the film is political, and I find that question difficult to answer. Everything is political and, for sure, ‘Barbie’ gets political, but the film takes its time to set up the parameters of the discussion first and chooses the tone of whimsy and light-hearted comedy. It doesn’t go deep or hit hard until way after the film’s midpoint and you’ve been completely taken over by the absurdist events and hilarity that when the politics comes in, it feels like part of the joke. It doesn’t take away from the truth and the authenticity of it, but it gets to make its statements and they are powerful ones.

After all, the movie presents us with the idea of Barbie world – a place where all the Barbies ever produced (even the discontinued ones) live, living their lives in one perfect day over and over – as an actual place as much as it is an idea. It’s a world that can be left to go to the real world, “our world,” and it can also be visited by humans. When one particular Barbie begins to think of thoughts about death (as seen in the trailer), her perfect world and perfect day is disrupted and her arched feet goes flat.

In order to discover what went wrong, she must travel to the real world to discover the truth. By her side is Ken, who feels his whole life’s objective is to be in support of Barbie. He has no other function, otherwise.

But when they go to the real world, it’s not the world that they expected: not a world of empowered women. Instead, it is a difficult world where men are in power. And things start to change.

What’s great about ‘Barbie’ is that it’s an unhinged, absurdist comedy that is inherently satirical but manages to disguise its most biting commentaries in the form of silliness. It is so fully committed to its style and form that you never feel like the film is standing on a pulpit, though the film actually does go into political monologues. It’s just done in such a way that it is part of the humour and so deep into the film’s narrative that, by that time, you are completely unguarded and just willing to take whatever this film dishes out.

This is achieved by the film’s campy tone – everything is just absurdly colourful and outrageous in its visual style – it leans on the fictional mode that it even skirts the line between cheesy special effects and more sophisticated ones. What is equally incredible is how its stars – most notably Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling – fully commit to the style and aesthetic of this movie.

In fact, Robbie and Gosling provide incredibly textured and nuanced performances. They understand that they are both ideas and actual beings. Robbie works on the level of physicality, her face and body movements are fully in line with that of what a Barbie doll looks like but manages to convey her character’s every thought and feeling. It’s such delicate work that it’s impressive. It’s award-worthy, to be honest. But the one who steals the show is Ryan Gosling, who is so committed to the silliness of his character (and his character gets to do more silly stuff than Robbie’s, who delves into the more existential themes of the film) that it can take center stage sometimes.

But both are amazing and so are the rest of the cast, including such an earnest performance from American Ferrera, who gets the film’s most powerful monologue

For all of the films artifice and how much it leans into its fakeness (of concept, of aesthetic, of its filmmaking) it manages to hit some hard truths about some pressing issues. The film manages to tackle identity and purpose, the roles that are impressed upon us by society, feminism and patriarchy, commercialism, and the pitfalls of capitalism. It manages to poke fun of these things while still asking very serious questions in the process.

And as the film reaches its fever pitch in a huge musical number that is as crazy as it is silly, the film manages to enter a very existential, philosophical conclusion that is completely opposite of the rest of the film, but it feels fitting and honest. The film earns it anyway. It earns every laugh, and every hard-hitting truth that it manages to touch upon.

My Rating:

BARBIE is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here.

July 20, 2023
Movie Review: ‘Oppenheimer’ is everything you’d expect from a Christopher Nolan film

As expected from any Christopher Nolan movie, ‘Oppenheimer’ is visually stunning and presents the story of the invention of the atomic bomb in an epic manner that captures the gravity of that discovery and manages to ponder on the consequences of such. Since his exploration on the concept of cinematic time in his film ‘Interstellar,’ (and even as far back as ‘Memento’) Nolan has been exploiting the way movies can bend and distort time to present the story of theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer through the narrative framework of two important events of his life – forming the team of scientists and building the site that gave birth to the invention of the atom bomb and the subsequent attack upon him by the American government for his dealings with socialists and the far left – which unfolds in a non-linear manner to dazzling effect.

The narrative of ‘Oppenheimer’ unfolds from different time frames. They include his early life as a student of theoretical physics and moving to Germany to learn about the new theories of physics to his rise in the ranks of the American academe to his appointment as the head of the Manhattan Project where he lead the team that invented the atomic bomb all the way to the later parts of his life when he was questioned for his dealings with the far left. The past is presented in full color while the later periods are told in black and white and through the perspective of Lewis Strauss, who is nominated for a cabinet post in the White House and is being questioned for his engagement with Oppenheimer.

What the non-linear storytelling does is that it connects all facets of Oppenheimer’s life with each other in a visual tapestry that suggests causality: his engagement with socialism, communism, and left-wing ideology and how this entangled him into the world of politics as his brilliance in his field brings him to the attention of the powers that be. The nuclear race had begun, and World War II was at full-swing and he had the know-how to possibly end it with a weapon that was to end all wars. But as the film continues to jump back and forth in time, what the film does is shows humanity’s greed and hunger for power, in all shapes and sizes, whether it be individual or in the form of an institution or government.

‘Oppenheimer’ is focused on the bigger themes of morality – putting the narrative spotlight on the scientist’s thought and feelings about creating a bomb so powerful that it could risk destroying the world and glosses over the other aspects of his human frailty such as his infidelity (which has more implications on his politics) or his arrogance and self-importance (though the film underlines that he was deserving of this stance).

The back and forth of its narrative style brings a sort of energy into the piece, along with the relentless musical score of Ludwig Goransson, that makes the film feel epic, important, and urgent. It is constantly building momentum towards both the eventual test of the atomic bomb in New Mexico and the buildup of the closed-door inquiry of Oppenheimer’s leftist dealings as well as Strauss’ own inquiry for his cabinet post. All three events are interlinked that sets to amplify what the film seems to be pointing at: that man cannot be trusted with any power whatsoever. Even with Oppenheimer’s own reluctance and eventual submission to the call for harnessing the power of the atom, the government that requested for it took it from him the moment it was done and used it for their own ends.

As much as the film underscores that Oppenheimer wanted this to be the end of all wars, what the film also manages to highlight is how this was also the beginning of a sort of end for human civilization. It is a triumph in Nolan’s direction that he was able to use Oppenheimer’s story as a fulcrum of when things may have started to go bad for the world.

L to R: Robert Downey Jr is Lewis Strauss and Matthew Modine is Vannevar Bush in OPPENHEIMER, written, produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan.

Rami Malek is David Hill in OPPENHEIMER, written, produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan.

Nolan is always an interesting director who is able to push boundaries and whose visual style is just perfect for large scale storytelling. He can make a room full of scientists talking about theoretical physics the most interesting thing to watch on the big screen because he understands how to contextualise it through cinema – the scenes preceding it and the context as to why they are having this discussion. Nolan is a storyteller that can present such things in a captivating way.

And it helps that he’s got fantastic actors to help bring out the best of his work. Cillian Murphy is captivating as Oppenheimer, and he manages to do so in the large span of time that Nolan has chosen to tell his story. Murphy has to play him from as young as an eager student in Germany to him at his prime while working on the Manhattan Project and then later on in life as an accomplished man and watching the world pass him by. Emily Blunt also gives a powerful performance with what little she’s given to do (though she does have one moment where she steals the show from everybody). But if anyone manages to really steal everyone’s thunder, it is Robert Downey Jr as Lewis Strauss.

As Strauss, Downey is a fireball igniting every scene he is in. There is a huge range of emotions that is required of him, and he delivers each on a silver platter. It’s a more flashy role than Murphy’s so while Cillian Murphy serves to anchor the film to its main character, it’s the rest of the cast like Blunt, Matt Damon, and Downey Jr who pushes the sails and really helps this movie take flight.

While all of Nolan’s creative team from Cinematographer Hoyt van Hoytema to editor Jennifer Lame and production designer Ruth De Jong and Goransson’s impeccable score are working at peak levels, ‘Oppenheimer’ proves to be exactly what I was expecting from a Christopher Nolan movie about the famous physicist. Except for two nude scenes that felt out of place, and a little too much figurative use of Oppenheimer’s hallucinations on the effects of the nuclear destruction, the film does exactly what it sets out to do in Nolan’s style. It isn’t as surprising as say ‘Inception’ nor does it have that effect of the sublime that ‘Dunkirk’ manages to evoke.

While I appreciate the way ‘Oppenheimer’ highlights the vile practices of any government – in this case, America’s – and man’s own unfitting nature to regulate and safeguard such vital knowledge like how to harness the power of the atom and nuclear energy and what seems like such a nuance treatment of the man’s dealings with socialism and communism; the film is enjoyable for what it is. I don’t know why I was expecting more.

My Rating:

OPPENHEIMER is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here.

July 20, 2023
Movie Review: Deus Ex Machina: A review of ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One’

One amazing thing about the Mission Impossible franchise is that it always leaned in towards its fictional world so while it can mirror real world events, it never really feels overtly political. It’s enemies were all vague and opaque so as to not upset anyone in politically. If it ever did, I don’t remember it but it doesn’t bother me. You could enjoy it for what it is: a straight-up, fun, action spy adventure. It was good versus evil and always executed in the most amazing ways possible in cinema.

So when you consider the fact that ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One’ began filming in 2020 and wrapped up filming in 2021, then you will understand how prescient the filmmakers were in the crafting of this movie. This time, Ethan Hunt and the rest of the Impossible Mission Force (the IMF) are battling advanced technology – one that carries no allegiances and has no recognizable agenda. The enemy is an advanced AI that has global internet access and can disrupt, distort, and disable any of our digital devices. When you consider that the IMF and all the spies and governments in the world use digital technology for everything, you can understand the power this AI holds.

Tom Cruise and Christopher McQuarrie on the set of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning – Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

If this film gets political, it’s basically within the context that instead of stopping it, all governments and institutions are after its control. It seems only Ethan Hunt has the moral fortitude, and the experience and skill sets to put this AI down and ensure that no one gets it. This puts the IMF as the biggest enemy of the nations of the world; not to mention that AI itself is out to protect its own best interest. Interestingly enough, this premise is so believable, how it hinges upon our belief that governments and people with power do not fear the dangers of such an AI existing. In this current age of AI art and AI written materials, director and writer Christopher McQuarrie and co-writer Erik Jendressen somehow predicted how AI would be received by a general public. They seem to have made a film, unlike the message of ‘Terminator’ or ‘The Matrix’ with regards to sentient machines. Here, the enemy, once again, is us and the people in power who would rather try and take control of a powerful tool regardless of the dangers and the cost than err in the side of caution.

Tom Cruise and Christopher McQuarrie on the set of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

The premise is so strong that it highlights the heroism of a character like Ethan Hunt. Here is a man who is so capable and the world of Mission Impossible is so lucky to have him because he is so morally constant. It’s such a fictional approach and the film indulges in this mode. There’s even a scene where members of the American security council are trying to understand the whole purpose of the IMF – even to the point of making fun of its name – that amplifies the ridiculousness of the whole concept. That one scene underlines the absurdity, but it also impresses upon us that it takes a person of Ethan’s inherent, unmoving goodness to survive the temptations of this sort of work. It’s idealistic and completely unrealistic but it’s also fun to watch onscreen.

Tom Cruise and Christopher McQuarrie on the set of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

McQuarrie knows how to keep all of this interesting. The story is straightforward and simple – like most of the films in the franchise – and he keeps the plot moving. In the first hour alone, we have a submarine fight, a foot chase in an airport, a battle in the desert during a sandstorm, and a car chase in the streets of Rome – the pace is relentless, it only stops to contextualize the mission and what is at stake and even that is done in a way that is exciting. The tensions are high, the urgency is always evident, and the characters are always on the move.

When there are quiet or still moments, McQuarrie is only using it as a build up for a bigger, more explosive scene later on. And he never lingers. The relationships between Hunt and his crew are so ingrained in previous installments that the film confidently just shows us enough to remind us but keeps the narrative in motion.

Hayley Atwell, Pom Klementieff, Vanessa Kirby and Christopher McQuarrie on the set of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

So, while the film is filled to the brim with exciting action pieces whether they are car chases, shoot outs, hand-to-hand combat, and whatnot, McQuarrie and his amazing actors deliver all of this with such speed and brutality that it is just enjoyable to see on screen. They are not even above taking a moment to have a visual, slapstick gag about a pumped-up fiat in the streets of Rome. It had everyone laughing for the sheer silliness of the scene.

Tom Cruise on the set of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

Tom Cruise has really made Ethan Hunt his own. They are almost completely interchangeable at this point. You either like it or you don’t but he knows this character in and out and still manages to find new places to bring him. Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg are back as Luther and Benji and are always such capable support teams. But say what you will about Cruise, he has populated the later installments of the Mission Impossible franchise with a lot of interesting and capable women and while Haley Atwell and Pom Klementieff is a new addition to the franchise, we see the return of Rebecca Ferguson and Vanessa Kirby, both are excellent in their respective roles of Ilsa Faust and White Widow.

Pom Klementieff in Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning – Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

While Klementieff gets to show a different side of her this time round (and a lot more of her athletic skills), it is Haley Atwell who gets the biggest role here. Atwell’s Grace is an interesting character because her story is an origin story, so to speak, and somehow we will discover that it parallels that of Ethan, Luther, and Benji. Her introduction sort of gives us an insight into the backstories of the three veteran IMF members. It feels like a full circle even if we never saw how it began (though the film touches upon Ethan’s origin, teases us with it in this installment).

Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

In a cinematic landscape that is overfilled with franchises and sequels, I’m actually always eager for another Mission Impossible story. There’s something about the Tom Cruise stamp that what we’re going to get will always set a new bar in what we can see in terms of action sequences and explosive thrills. Unlike other action stars who try to put socially relevant story points in their franchises to justify its continued existence or overstuff later installments with too much CGI and big-name cameos, ‘Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One’ proves that all you need is to just constantly be serving up simple stories told extremely well. Mcquarrie and Cruise, as a partners, just have that magical touch to deliver the goods.

The fact that they turned this story into one about AI and the danger of advanced technology seems so timely but, really, it’s just prophetic. Another testament that these two filmmakers are still at the top of their game and have their hands on the pulse of the world.

My Rating:

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – DEAD RECKONING PART ONE is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here.

July 13, 2023
MOVIE REVIEW: Subtle as a sledgehammer, ‘The Little Mermaid’ loses its innocence when turned real

When ‘The Little Mermaid’ came out in 1989, I was just a ten-year old kid, who grew up on cartoons and musical theater. Watching the original ‘The Little Mermaid’ in the cinemas back when it first came out was a core memory for me: the lush and fluid (for its time) animation, the catchy music and songs of Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, the visual romance of the underwater world they crafted and the playful tonal grace that they worked on the first of many new animated series that were based on fairy tales and legends. We hadn’t seen one since ‘Sleeping Beauty’ and ‘Cinderella.’

Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney’s live-action THE LITTLE MERMAID. Photo courtesy of Disney. © 2023 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

‘The Little Mermaid’ is just so iconic and I really thought hard about why anyone would want to turn it into a live action remake. What would a live-action remake of the-already perfect cartoon (in my memory) add to the story? There was an innocence that tempered the shades of teen angst and rebellion that came with the original animated feature film. Yes, Ariel fell in love with a boy she’s only seen from a distance and turned her world upside down to be “a part of his world,” which was acceptable in the 90s and in a cartoon character. In a live action remake, my fears came true: the living, breathing portrayal of these characters wouldn’t be able to survive the same scrutiny as its animated counterpart.

(L-R): Scuttle (voiced by Awkwafina), Flounder (voiced by Jacob Tremblay), and Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney’s live-action THE LITTLE MERMAID. Photo courtesy of Disney. © 2023 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The sequences underwater – probably a mix of live footage and a lot of CGI (so how “live-action” is this film?) – are lush and vibrant with a moving fluid tapestry of sea flora and fauna that tries to recreate the romanticism of the underwater world. Director Rob Marshall, not the most subtle of directors, has a tendency of overdoing every image and showing off his massive budget. When we first see Ariel and later, Flounder, and then Sebastian, we are forced to accept these CGI heavy personas as real.

(L-R): Halle Bailey as Ariel and Javier Bardem as King Triton in Disney’s live-action THE LITTLE MERMAID. Photo courtesy of Disney. © 2023 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Sure, Hallee Bailey is really there but there is an effect that their hair underwater takes that makes everything look so unflattering (this most obvious with Javier Bardem’s King Triton). In order to approximate being in the water, Bailey, Bardem, Melissa McCarthy (who plays Ursula) must move in very specific ways to simulate being in the water. It isn’t most graceful look and along with the heavy special effects, it’s more distracting than anything else.

In fact, all the actors who have to perform and act under the water are at their worst. It seems they can’t focus on their scene and the emotions because they are involved in the physicality of their movements. McCarthy has the unenviable task of working with Ursula’s relentless blocking – constantly changing positions, mimicking the movements of Ursula in the cartoon – that she can’t really have a moment to just be in character.

And now that Ariel is a living, breathing person – flesh and blood and not literally drawn up – she is now judged for the lengths that she will go to so that she can be part of Eric’s world. She’s a daughter of Triton, a teen with responsibilities over one of the seven seas, and yet she will bring her friend Flounder to forbidden waters where sharks are (and being told that he can’t swim as fast she can) and endanger his life for her fascination with anything above world.

Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney’s live-action THE LITTLE MERMAID, directed by Rob Marshall. Photo by Giles Keyte. © 2021 Disney Enterprises Inc. All Rights Reserved.

In the cartoon, all these actions – the hoarding of items found in shipwrecks, breaking the rules – take a form of innocence; but in the live action, they feel real, and dangerous, and foolish and hard to root for.

With Bailey, struggling to keep Ariel life-like and in sync with the physics of being under the sea, she isn’t able to give us her all. It is when she makes her deal with Ursula, and she goes above water that you can see the actress at work. Bailey can act and gives Ariel more passion, more fire. She’s a teen at the cusp of womanhood and ready to break loose. It’s a dangerous thing to see, as the film excuses her rebellion as a romantic ideal – of fighting for allowing children to forge their own path – but not realizing that she’s still a teen and her choices have endangered her best friend, she falls in love with a person she watched from afar and makes a deal with a witch.

In a cartoon, it’s excusable. Live action, with Hailee Bailey right there making these decisions, she comes across as spoiled and entitled and deserves all the trouble that comes her way (except other suffer in the wake of her decisions).

(L-R): Jonah Hauer-King as Prince Eric and Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney’s live-action THE LITTLE MERMAID. Photo by Giles Keyte. © 2023 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Narratively, this version of ‘The Little Mermaid’ takes all the same beats as the original cartoon – except Eric (Jonah Hauer-King) is given more of a backstory and his own song, and they added new songs as well – so they don’t really say anything new about the story. The arc is the same, the ending is the same, nothing has changed but that it’s bigger, that it’s not a cartoon but played out by actual people and what it has done is show how superficial and shallow Ariel’s choices may have been.

There is a parallelism created between Ariel and Eric, two royals whose lives are dictated upon by a parent, and they want something different from what has been planned for them. The film wants the young people to question the paths set upon them by their parents and for parents to listen to their children.

Unfortunately, the film shows us the dangers of allowing teenagers to make grown-up decisions. Sure, everything ended up happily ever after but that’s the Disney touch at work. Even when Ariel gives up her voice to get what she wants, the film gives her two songs that she sings (in her head, to maximize Bailey’s beautiful voice) but what it ends up doing is discrediting the sacrifice that she makes. I actually like one of the new songs, ‘For the First Time,’ but I can’t stand that it invalidates the price that she pays for legs.

Marshall went all out for spectacle and commercial appeal. As subtle as a sledgehammer, he hits all the original beats at their exact spots to appeal to the nostalgia of those who loved the original film and hope the same magic that struck over thirty years ago will happen again with a new generation of viewers.

But judging from the applause and oohs and ahhs of the audience I was with at the cinema, the crowd ate it all up anyway.

My Rating:

THE LITTLE MERMAID is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here

May 26, 2023
MOVIE REVIEW: It’s All About the Money: a review of ‘Air’

For all the great filmmaking in Ben Affleck-directed ‘Air’ – from the exquisite tight shots and the deep dive into the zeitgeist of the 80s, as well as fantastic performances by Viola Davis and Chris Messina – there is something that is completely empty in the film that dramatizes probably one of the greatest sports deal in history. The movie is about the deal that partners up Nike with the basketball legend Michael Jordan. The 112-minute film is really just a pitch that a talent scout in the sports brand attempts to make with a very promising rookie back in 1984. The film benefits from everyone knowing the legacy of the legendary basketball player – even someone like me who is not familiar with basketball, even I know who Michael Jordan is – and are all aware of how much the sneaker industry makes a year.

Basically, we all come in knowing this is going to be a happy ending. So all the film has to do is to create the stakes and try to make it all fun to watch. Affleck goes full-on with his depiction of the 80s – the fashion, the production design, even the picture quality has that saturated 80s look – and it helps create that world. We are so steeped into it.

The story follows Matt Damon, who plays Sonny Vaccaro, who has to help Nike find an athlete to endorse their show, or they’ll have to close down their basketball division and focus just on their running shoes. In 1984, Nike was not the powerhouse that it was then and was only third to Adidas and Converse. They don’t have prime picks and Sonny must make magic or the whole division gets shut down.

Instead of spending their small budget on three mid-level players, Sonny insists on spending the whole budget on just one player: a rookie called Michael Jordan. And this is where the film fails to truly capture the imagination of the audience and proves that the film might be nothing more than an expensive, star-studded Nike commercial: the story, with a screenplay by Alex Convery, only creates one scene that shows us that Vaccaro has found THE player to endorse.

After watching one short clip from one of his games, Vaccaro is sure that Michael Jordan is going to be the greatest player ever. We know it. We saw it happen and it’s truly the stuff of legend. But the film relies on this and leaves the rest to our stock knowledge.

Sonny then spends the rest of the movie convincing everyone at Nike to put everything on this one rookie and then, later on, spends the second half convincing Jordan’s mother (played by a fantastic Viola Davis) that they should sign up with Nike. That’s it. That’s the whole movie – it’s a movie about a pitch, and a successful one at that – and while the movie tries to show us the stakes that was at play and the risk that so many people took – expressed beautifully in a scene between Damon’s Sonny Vaccaro and his co-worker Rob Strasser played by Jason Bateman – at the end of the day it’s a movie about a big million-dollar company making even more millions.

There is an attempt to put the importance in Michael Jordan’s legacy – that the deal Deloris Jordan, Michael Jordan’s mother, insists upon giving her son a huge amount of benefits that was unheard of at that period of time – but this doesn’t ring true because never once the film take the time to show us what a great player he is. We know it. The film knows we know it but by not giving any screen time to Jordan on the court everything becomes hearsay. Millions and millions of dollars and the jobs of so many people are at stake because this athlete is supposed to be worth it, and they never bother to show us this.

In fact, they never even show us Michael Jordan’s face. They get an actor, Damian Delano Young, to play the young Michael Jordan but they never show his face, shooting always at an off angle favoring Davis or Damon, and never letting him speak. If this story is about his greatness as an athlete, if the push was to show us that the skill and the promise of this young basketball player was enough to cause this much trouble, how come we never get to see him play or see his face?

No, what is given emphasis here is the money: how much were they willing to risk, and how much they were going to make. There’s no real character development here – Sonny Vaccaro, Rob Strasser, Deloris Jordan – they are exactly the same people when this movie started but they just ended up much richer. At the end of the film, they put down some facts about how much Air Jordans, the shoe that is at the center of the film, sold that year and the years to follow and how much Michael Jordan makes every year because of this deal – and it’s a lot – and, sure, it talks about how Deloris Jordan has opened up charities and gives back.

But it is a whole lot to do about money. They put so much emphasis on the possible loss of the basketball division but also mention that the company was already making so much in running shoes. They weren’t going to go bankrupt at all.

Yes, great performances – Viola Davis, Chris Messina, and even a wonderful cameo turn by Marlon Wayans – and some snappy dialogue and great camera work (though the music is so intrusive and overselling the 80s vibe way too much) but at the end of the day, it feels like a commercial or a product placement.

My Rating:

—
Air is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here

Photo Credit: “Warner Bros. Pictures”

April 27, 2023
The Surprising Tender Heart of ‘Three Thousand Years of Longing’

Based on the trailer, ‘Three Thousand Years of Longing’ looks like a crazy, out-of-the-box fantasy tale involving two incredible actors – Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba – and the out of this world imagination of director George Miller.

Miller, who has shown great depth and versatility having directed both ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ and the penguin musical ‘Happy Feet’ as well as directing the delightful 80s women-centric supernatural comedy ‘The Witches of Eastwick’ and then dramatic biopic ‘Lorenzon’s Oil.’ His filmography is such that it can bring a rush of excitement over whatever project he conjures up next and what aspect of the human condition he plans to turn into some cinematic spectacle.

Photo courtesy of Go Asia Entertainment

Tilda Swinton plays Alithea Binnie, a narratologist, who discovers a djinn (genie) in a bottle during an academic conference in Turkey. As a narratologist, Alithea is vastly knowledgeable about stories of all kinds, and is an expert in mythology and ancient lore. During her conference, she exhibits hallucinations of mystical beings that engage with her but no one else can see. Are they all in her mind or are they really happening?

So when the djinn (played by Idris Elba) is freed, it doesn’t take much for Alithea to understand what is happening and what is at stake when the djinn tells her that he is obliged to grant her three wishes. But as someone who is well-versed in the stories of man, of different cultures and different eras of human civilization, Alithea is not one to be so hasty and what unravels is a story within a story, akin to The Tales of the Arabian Nights and the story of Scheherezade.

Photo courtesy of Go Asia Entertainment

What begins in a hotel room in Turkey, with Alithea in a bathrobe and the djinn eventually following suit, discussing the parameters of their arrangement, the story shifts into the many tales of both Alithea and the djinn and the scenes shift to the stories they weave.

Each story is set in a lush, extravagantly production designed wonder of that era. A story about the Queen of Sheba or a story about a prince of the Ottoman empire brings us to these moments with a casting that befits these characters and while a lot of the story is told through the narration of Elba or Swinton, when the characters do speak, it is of the language of that land and of that era. On paper, the narrative is a lonely narratologist and djinn talking in a hotel room exchanging stories but what you see are foreign lands in a different time. Miller’s playful use of the camera allows us to go into the heart of these stories, and as the title of the film suggests, they are stories about longing and love and desire.

Photo courtesy of Go Asia Entertainment

I was expecting a riotous, frenetic film filled with bombastic visuals as the trailer suggests but instead, I found myself marveling at the tender heart that is beating at the center of this film. It is visually stunning but it was unexpectedly warm and poignant. The film doesn’t only highlight the power of stories in our lives – how we use it everyday in the way with which we see ourselves and the world – but it also explores the various nature of our wishes and desires.

Swinton and Elba take this eccentric, whimsical little fairy tale and manage to infuse their characters with so much humanity, Swinton playing a caricature of the intelligent, introverted master of stories with such precision that when her character makes a sudden realisation later in the film about what it is she truly desires, the caricature almosts fades immediately and she suddenly becomes human in an instant. It’s something that happens without a cut, a sudden epiphany that happens in a sparkle of her eyes. Playing off of this is Elba, who is at home playing an otherworldly being, who possesses great power but also a sad history. It’s there in his posture, in the way he plays with his voice.

Photo courtesy of Go Asia Entertainment

‘Three Thousand Years of Longing’ is an unexpected visual feast that is more a love story than it is a supernatural, mythical adventure. It’s a modern fairytale about love and desire and the cost of such an emotion in this world, whether human or djinn. It is not afraid to be unconventional or weird. It is not afraid to be steeped into the world of its own stories and then to push back into the modernity of the narrative framework of its own film. It’s refreshing, surprising in how bold and daring it is and, as he always does, George Miller has surprised me once again.

My Rating:

–

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Distributed by Go Asia Entertainment, Three Thousand Years of Longing is now showing in cinemas nationwide. Buy your tickets here.

September 14, 2022
Take a Ride on the Crazy Train: a review of ‘Bullet Train’

I’m not exactly sure what I just saw but I sure as hell had a good time watching it. ‘Bullet Train’ is a flippant action comedy that works on a very stylized, hyper-real world of assassins and very self-aware filmmaking. Director David Leitch throws away character development for a zany, ultra-violent madcap caper of five (or was it six? There are so many in this movie!) assassins with different missions aboard one bullet train in Japan, who discover that their missions are all interconnected.

Taking the lead is Brad Pitt as Ladybug, who has just come out of hiatus to do a “simple job” and is trying to find a new approach to life through the help of a therapist. He discusses all of this with his handler, Maria (voiced by Sandra Bullock). It’s interesting that the lead is a mercenary who has come back to the field as he tries to philosophize and rationalize his actions, whether it’s stealing, assaulting, or even killing the various occupants in the train.

Brad Pitt is in fine form here, oozing with charisma and a dazzling display of physical strength and agility (online, it says he did 95% of his own stunts). He gives the audience someone to root for as each new assassin that is introduced just seems crazier than the last one.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Brian Tyree Henry are a pair who has to deliver the son of a Russian gangster and some stolen cash to the final destination of the train in Kyoto. They are a verbose duo, who are as ruthless as they are unintentionally funny. Their dialogue can get a bit much and slow things down at the start but as the action begins to build momentum, everything gets used in the end.

Photo: Columbia Pictures

Andrew Koji is a forlorn father, who takes the train to find and kill the man who pushed his son off a building but gets entangled with Joey King’s The Prince, a schoolgirl with a dark past of her own. Koji is an arresting actor and feels under-utilised here, considering the film opens with his story. His character’s struggle would seem one that is likely to bring audiences in but it’s too heavy for the light and comedic tone of the film so it takes a step back as Leitch and screenwriter Zak Olkewicz opts to take the gags and the action.

Also in the film are Bad Bunny, Hiroyuki Sanada, Michael Shannon, Logan Lerman, Zazie Beetz, and some surprising cameos that are fun and just add to the formalist aesthetic of the film. Everyone seems to be having fun here and it makes the whole thing enjoyable even if the film doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Photo: Columbia Pictures

There’s no real character arc that’s happening in the movie. Much like Ladybug’s musings, ruminating about fate and coincidence, the film plays out like a farce with no real-world associations. It’s not a satire or a social commentary. It’s not a battle between good and bad. It’s just bad people doing bad things and in what could be a really fun way depending on what you consider fun in movies.

It’s clever both visually and in its scripting. The film jumps into flashbacks to deepen the history of these characters but only when needed and not set up methodically so as to create a sense of build-up. The scenes cut to the next moment where the tension can rise or when we can get the most laughs.

There are 16 cars in the bullet train but the only way for these characters to move is forward or backward, which means there are no places to run or hide. In this way, all the five groups of killers are going to collide at some point and it just gets crazier and crazier as it goes along; all the way to a grand finish that feels like they threw everything and the kitchen sink at us for full effect.

Photo: Columbia Pictures

And while ‘Bullet Train’ is narratively thin, it’s a hell of a fun ride. At some point, you realise no one is safe, you can’t take anything seriously, pleasantly surprised by the sudden cameos, and so forth. It’s a kind of irreverence that feels at home in a crazy world where nothing really matters. Maybe five years ago it would have been disappointing as I search for some sort of meaning but now, I’m very much welcome to this sort of insanity on screen.

Now I’m really curious about the novel that the film is based on by Kotaro Isaka.

My Rating:

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Bullet Train opens in cinemas nationwide on August 10, Wednesday.

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August 8, 2022