Doing David Grann justice: The Lost City Of Z, 2017's best film so far

Though you might not have heard of him, David Grann will soon be a film-making titan.

A New Yorker 'reporter at large', Grann writes non-fiction for the weekly publication with a panache and style you might expect from a fiction writer. His reportage typically focuses on thrilling (though never salacious) exposes; stories that leave you wondering why you have not heard of them previously. It's not far off the style of Capote; narrative non-fiction or the non-fiction novel, whichever way you like.

His published collection of stories, The Devil And Sherlock Holmes, was followed by two feature-length non-fictions; The Lost City Of Z and, earlier this year, Killers Of The Flower Moon. The latter is in pre-production with Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio. Several of his New Yorker stories are at various stages of adaptation; True Crimes, a US/Polish production, is due later this year. Old Man And The Gun, starring Robert Redford and Casey Affleck, will arrive next year. A Foreigner, based on a Grann highlight (A Murder Foretold), has bumped around various homes and currently sits with Oscar Isaac and Alfonso Gomez-Rejon.

The Lost City Of Z, the first of Grann's works to make it to the screen, holds not only promise but the title of the best film of 2017 so far.

Adapting Grann should in theory be simple, because he writes 'scenes', as a fiction writer predisposed to screenwriting might. But the nuance of why Grann's stories are so successful is in the detail. The above could be terrible, a fundamentally bankrupted version of events, told with a great degree of entertainment and perhaps little dedication to accuracy. But that's not how Grann reads. Instead, his prose makes the culprits more vivid, the heroes more flawed, the spot-on reportage more reliant on facts.

Percy Fawcett (Charlie Hunnam), the 'hero' of The Lost City Of Z is a case in point. As Grann tells it, Fawcett was not a fantastic family man, may well have been more interested in chasing fame and fortune than anything else and was, by the conclusion of things, quite possibly driven to some form of mania or madness.

Director James Gray tones Fawcett down a touch. He is, without a doubt, a heroic figure here. But Gray and star Charlie Hunnam stick the landing. There is more than a suggestion that Fawcett is at fault for some of the events of the history, even more than that that Fawcett does not do right by his family, as his father did not do right by him. Crucially, the finale of Fawcett's story, as told by Grann, is maintained by Gray. It might be the reason the film was not a large hit with audiences.

Gray is growing a reputation as an auteur director who can get more than expected out of actors, sometimes with mixed-quality material. He does his reputation no harm here. There's no doubt that this is Hunnam's best work and there's a very solid argument that The Lost City Of Z is the same for Robert Pattinson and Sienna Miller. Miller gets great writing from Gray, who refuses to allow her character to just be the 'stay at home wife'. Hunnam and Pattinson are occasionally unrecognisable; Pattinson - in beard, spectacles and drooping hat - literally so. Hunnam's 'gentleman's accent' is wonderful; the right level of false to make you question Fawcett, rather than Hunnam's performance.

He too is in-tune with Grann's narrative style; present the facts, thrillingly, and the reader can draw their own conclusions of character fortitude.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Half-cocked 'epicness' and unfulfilled ambition in Free State Of Jones

At one-hundred and thirty-nine minutes there is no danger of Free State Of Jones being called 'slight'. Gary Ross' film is on the 'long and weighty' side of things, conceived, perhaps, for Oscar contention.

It wasn't to be. The civil war Drama took just $20 million at the US box office ($25 million worldwide), against a production budget of $50 million. It joined a legion of films which, despite a popular historical subject and major star (Matthew McConaughey), failed to capture the imagination of cinemagoers.

The length of the film speaks to one of the reasons why, one of the many internal conflicts at the film's heart, which mean that it almost defies standard review logic. Good luck attempting to give Free State Of Jones a star rating. Some elements are superb. Others are borderline amateur. One-hundred and thirty-nine minutes, for example, speaks to a underlying commitment anxiety. This is an epic. The film's narrative spreads several years of the civil war and jumps forwards to the 1940s (by implication, the themes the film explicitly deal with go further than that). One-hundred and thirty-nine minutes isn't long enough to do that. Characters get completely lost. Many points of the narrative receive insubstantial examination.

There's no greater representation of the film's problems than Keri Russell's Serena, wife to McConaughey's Newton Knight. Russell is a recognisable face and, early on, a focus, personifying the problems faced by many of the film's female characters as their men are rounded up by the Confederates. There's what seems to be a key sequence for Newton and Serena, where their child falls ill, and then that's it; Serena disappears from the narrative and, in time, it becomes clear that the whole affair was a setup for Rachel (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), who heals the child.

Until... Serena returns, completely out of the blue late on, with limited explanation of why she left to begin with, what she has been doing for, apparently, several years and why she is now back. If the film had committed to its own scope then perhaps we could have spent time with Serena's narrative as well and seen the period from her point of view. As it is, she is lost.

The film also occupies the uncomfortable sub-genre of liberal narratives which display their liberality by having a white protagonist recount to us what is largely African-American history. Whilst Newton Knight is undoubtedly an important character in his own time, he is important because he is documented and covered in the annals. Many others are not. Ross attempts to address this with a smattering of supporting characters who are again ill-served by the editing of the script (whether in pre or post production). In another world Mahershala Ali wins his Oscar for this film and not Moonlight. In fact, in another world Ali is the lead character, the story told from his perspective. Again, it wasn't to be and the balance is off.

The 1940s scenes will bear the brunt of most people's ire towards the film. They are odd. The syntax of how they are interwoven into the narrative is jarring, the lead in this section is not Matthew McConaughey and their real reason for existence isn't offered until the mid-way point, at best, and that's only for viewers who 'spot' where the court case on show is going.

Again though, you can see why they are there. Free State Of Jones, representative of its time though it is, is also out of time. It is our time and its own and the 1940s; representing and representative of civil liberties which still do not exist in anywhere near an adequate enough form. Unfortunately that straddling of time zones, that universal message, is too much for this film to bear. Frustratingly however, it does come close to taking the weight.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

The Autopsy Of Jane Doe - Blu-ray Review

'All the proof anyone might need that it's still possible to make a successful horror film using the tried and tested tropes of the genre'.

For a considerable chunk of its running time, The Autopsy Of Jane Doe is all the proof anyone might need that it's still possible to make a successful horror film using the tried and tested tropes of the genre. Apart from a brief opening scene, the entirety of André Øvredal's film takes place in a single location: the morgue run by Tommy Tilden (Brian Cox) and his son Austin (Emile Hirsch). The director patiently unfolds the mystery surrounding the titular cadaver through Tommy and Austin's post-mortem examination, gradually building up both the tension and the suggestion that supernatural forces may or may not be at play.

As such, The Autopsy Of Jane Doe essentially offers a fresh and intriguing twist on the haunted house set-up for much of its first half. It's a genuine shame then that Øvredal can't keep that momentum going as his film heads towards the closing act. It's possible to pinpoint the moment at which the director moves away from the palpable levels of suspense and intrigue he's created and shifts towards far more schlocky and unsubtle means of unnerving the audience. The chilling understatement and restraint used so well during the first forty five minutes or so are replaced by jump scares and occasional CGI elements which, whilst never terrible, lack the highly effective simplicity, precision and emotional care taken over what's come before.

Whilst he does manage to regain some of the earlier intrigue during the coda, what Øvredal delivers is ultimately a film of two halves, the second section being markedly less interesting and well executed than the first. What the director does have on his side throughout, however, is the central pairing of Cox and Hirsch, both of whom commit fully to the tone of both halves and who share a satisfying and believable subtly fractured relationship. Credit also deserves to go to Olwen Catherine Kelly who plays the Jane Doe of the title, making the task of being both genuinely menacing and a convincing corpse look remarkably easy all the way through. 

The Autopsy Of Jane Doe is available on UK Blu-ray, DVD and digital download now.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his PhD. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Prevenge - Blu-ray Review

'Takes a genuinely original high concept and turns it into a sub-90-minute feature that's really bloody good'.

There are all sorts of reasons to admire Alice Lowe's directorial debut Prevenge. There's the fact that Lowe is on both writing and leading lady duties alongside directing, doing at least two of these whilst also being heavily pregnant. There's also the fact that the vast majority of Prevenge was filmed in Cardiff in under two weeks on a relative shoestring. But, perhaps most importantly, it's a film which takes a genuinely original high concept and turns it into a sub-90-minute feature that's really bloody good. That high concept - expectant mother Ruth (Lowe) goes on a killing spree seemingly under the orders of her unborn child - is undoubtedly Prevenge's hook, something which Lowe never forgets and plays to her advantage throughout.

Her work with Ben Wheatley in particular has clearly influenced Lowe's approach to making her own film: both the tone and subject matter are somewhat similar to those of Wheatley's jet black comedy Sightseers, which Lowe both co-wrote and starred in. Whilst Prevenge regularly has a dark sense of humour, however, it feels first and foremost like a cult slasher flick. Lowe regularly infuses her film with the spirit of old school horror, with the unnerving soundtrack from electronic duo Toydrum adding to the sense of low-budget retro splatter even though the film's moments of bloody violence are in fact isolated and relatively understated. The relentless focus on Ruth's point of view and state of mind works well, with Lowe skilfully keeping the audience guessing just how much of what we're witnessing is all in Ruth's head until the very end through both her direction and performance.

Whilst the full story is unfolded with patience, where Prevenge perhaps falls down most often is in its narrative structure. Ruth's path from one murder to the next too often feels disconnectedly episodic, with some of her victims given little opportunity to become anything more than caricatures. Lowe seemingly does this to retain a sense of ambiguity as to how and why Ruth has chosen her victims, and indeed whether we should sympathise with them or not, but as more about Ruth's own circumstances is revealed throughout the film it's hard not to crave a more fleshed out target for her to hunt down. Tom (Kayvan Novak) is the closest Lowe gets to this, although the development he receives still feels only partially successful. 

Prevenge was released on UK Blu-ray and DVD on Monday 5th June 2017.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back - Online Review

'The minor crimes here read like a regular rap sheet of your common variety B-movie, which, for a time, this resembles more closely than it may previously have been possible to believe.'

Jack Reacher and Jack Reacher: Never Go Back had exactly the same budget, according to the data held by IMDb. What that creates is a fascinating case study in the difference changing key personnel can make to your end production. If only Paramount had changed but one of their director, writer and cinematographer for the series. You would have had as close as it is possible to get to an objective celluloid case study but, alas, with such creative changes en masse it is hard to know where to lay the blame for this offering.

Never Go Back's major crime is that it feels remarkably cheap. Sure, visual quality does not always represent overall quality, but when something looks like a Sunday evening serial (think: Marvel's Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D quality) it's hard to reflect that everyone is trying their hardest. If Never Go Back was a business card, signifying the quality of the business it represented, it would be a cheaply laminated, stained piece of cardboard, with faint crayon scribbles attempting to convey the key information.

The minor crimes here read like a regular rap sheet of your common variety B-movie, which, for a time, this resembles more closely than it may previously have been possible to believe. The script and story meander all over the place, taking in a junkie ex-consultant and sundry other characters who seem to have ill-defined missives to contribute to a plot which feels as vacant as Reacher's stare. The movement between acts is largely accomplished via a heavy dose of new character Sam's (Danika Yarosh) whining and poor choices and lots of Reacher (Tom Cruise) and Major Turner (Cobie Smulders) running across open areas, doing their best impersonation of Robert Langdon and assorted sidekicks. It rarely feels purposeful. It almost always feel like woeful filler.

Whilst Cruise can sell sub-par material he really needs support to do so. Smulders does not advance her big screen credentials, Yarosh's character is too thinly sketched to pass judgement (but she does herself no favours) and villain Patrick Heusinger manages to out-Jai Courtney, Jai Courtney. It's a far cry from the original's boast of Cruise, Werner Herzog, Rosamund Pike, Richard Jenkins and David Oyelowo. The casting director seems to have changed too so I guess you can add another variable to the science experiment.

There are few redeeming features. The typical 'nameless man' Reacher introduction is nice and for a time the movement is probably just about fast enough to convince you something is happening that's worthwhile. But too soon after that you're treated to a terrible montage of Reacher's awkward wooing of Turner. Then, later, you're being reintroduced to Espin (Aldis Hodge) and realising you were meant to be interested in him, before being offered the aforementioned least convincing junkie of all time, followed by a plot that's not far behind that description. It's amateur hour and, whatever your thoughts on the first Reacher, you at least can't accuse the 2012 Reacher offering of that.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back was streaming via TalkTalk TV Store.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Christine - Blu-ray Review

'Campos infuses his film with the discomfort, anxiety and frustration of the title character: it's likely that you'll find Christine's high-strung paranoia burrowing its way into your own mind before long as you watch'.

Perhaps most importantly when telling the true story of a local news reporter who ended her life on live TV in 1974 by putting a gun to her head and pulling the trigger, director Antonio Campos ensures Christine is never exploitative. Campos deftly handles the many distressing episodes in Christine Chubbuck's (Rebecca Hall) life with sensitivity and respect, whilst also never being coy about the events leading up to her suicide. The director takes his time, spending much of the opening hour measuredly putting the different elements of Christine's life in place. It can make the first half of the film feel uneventful at times, especially in comparison with the second; but it's a decision which ensures that your investment in Christine is genuine before the film's more emotive sequences arrive.

That Campos continually resists both maudlin sympathy for his subject and feigning - or indeed forcing - understanding of why her life ended the way it did is key to Christine's sincerity as a biopic. A scene in which Christine is unexpectedly taken by a colleague to a self-help group provides the sole moment where she explicitly states the problems in her life, not to spell things out for the audience but to highlight just how disconnected Christine has become from the world. Vocalising her feelings to a complete stranger is just as ineffectual as never opening up to those she lives and works with every day.

The director's motivation here is instead an overriding sense of empathy, one which he achieves with increasingly impressive levels of success throughout. Campos infuses his film with the discomfort, anxiety and frustration of the title character: it's likely that you'll find Christine's high-strung paranoia burrowing its way into your own mind before long as you watch. A crowded, alcohol-fuelled 4th of July party at the home of her news station's owner is oppressive, uncomfortable and disorienting, making you want to exit the situation just as much as Christine clearly does.

Pivotal to Christine's success in achieving this is Hall's engrossing central performance. Hall transforms herself into Christine in a way that never feels like an impersonation, skilfully allowing her inner turmoil to rise to the surface in volatile fashion only once or twice. Perhaps the crowning achievement of Christine is the fact that, despite knowing how the story ends, Hall and Campos together make you hope against hope that things will actually turn out okay for Christine, whilst presenting you with a compelling narrative of why they ultimately did not.

Christine was released on UK Blu-ray and DVD on Monday 27th February 2017.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Remainder - Blu-ray Review

'all high ideas and concepts about pushing film structure and language, with few of the basic underpinnings in place'

Remainder piles several elements that can make for a unappetising film on top of each other and, like a mad scientist with a little knowledge and no clue, hopes that they emerge at the other end as something palatable. The risk has to be applauded but risk like this needs to be reigned in and tightened. At its worst, Remainder looks and feels like a pretentious student production; all high ideas and concepts about pushing film structure and language, with few of the basic underpinnings in place.

The plot sees Tom Sturridge's Tom crushed by a falling piece of building in the opening. Slowly recovering, he's the recipient of a large payout from sources undefined; a payout he uses to stage expensive reproductions of the former life he can no longer remember. Who was he and what was he doing, and is this side project a quest to reestablish his life, or life itself?

The first of the unpalatable elements creeps in quickly. Tom is a terrible person. Increasingly you see him as 'boss' to fixer-cum-producer Naz (Arsher Ali) and Sturridge plays him appropriately as a jumped-up upstart who won't accept the smallest thing out of place or incorrect answer back. It's irritating and it gets under your skin, but Sturridge is at least good at this sort of thing, as shown in Far From The Madding Crowd.

As the narrative progresses though it becomes increasingly impossible to care for Tom and what he's doing. Writer/director Omer Fast is unconcerned with revealing everything about his story (another of the problematic elements), which leaves his film rooted to Tom. As the protagonist gets increasingly wrapped up in the development of his recreated memory he gets more and more distant from the audience as the plot spirals to parts unknown.

Which leads us to the final problem. Ambiguous narratives are my favourite sort of narrative, but there's ambiguity and mess and Remainder falls well within the latter. The open-ended conclusion would work if some of the other plot items were tied up. There's a pair of corrupt policemen interested in Tom, for example, and whilst you can figure out why, their characterisation is straight from central casting and they show up just when things need a bit of disruption. Tom's friends, particularly Catherine (Cush Jumbo), are uninteresting hangers on at the start and reappear at the end, again without much explanation as to their motivations.

There is something here and the dedication to the twisty, undefined narrative is brave, but there's a lot of vital polish missing.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Metropolis (2001) - Blu-ray Review

'The shots directly influenced by Lang's film are regularly impressive: Tima's creation smartly parallels that of the Maschinenmensch, whilst the colossal ziggurat at the centre of Metropolis provides some of the film's most striking images'.

Ostensibly an adaptation of Osamu Tezuka's 1949 manga of the same name, which in itself took inspiration from Fritz Lang's hugely influential 1927 silent film (although Tezuka had only seen one image from Lang's film when creating his comic), it's perhaps not surprising that Metropolis continually feels caught between the different influences upon it. Together, director Rintaro and screenwriter Katsuhiro Otomo blend loose influences from previous works with ideas of their own and from elsewhere in the sci-fi genre.

The plot of Metropolis is therefore an amalgamation of several narrative influences, a decision that creates problems which Rintaro's film never manages to satisfyingly overcome. The sociopolitical elements which come largely from Lang's film never sits entirely comfortably alongside the relationship between teenager Kenichi (Kei Kobayashi) and advanced robot Tima (Yuka Imoto) which, apart from existing between a human and a machine, is largely conventional in its execution.

Whilst Lang occasionally made his film too thematically dense for its own good, the problem is greater here, Rintaro straining at several points under the weight of the commentary he takes on. A subplot involving workers waging an insurgency against the employment of robots in Metropolis struggles to get enough screen time during the first half, only to then be concluded a bit too hastily when the focus shifts further onto Kenichi and Tima's story later on.

Aesthetically, Metropolis owes just as much to Blade Runner as it does to its overt sources, the director achieving a satisfying postmodern style that blends futuristic sci-fi with hardboiled crime fiction. The occasional use of computer animation sits well alongside the traditional hand drawn artwork for the most part; the inclusion of a giant robotic CGI fish in the background of one early scene is distracting, but is thankfully uncharacteristic of the director's approach overall. The shots directly influenced by Lang's film are regularly impressive: Tima's creation smartly parallels that of the Maschinenmensch, whilst the colossal ziggurat at the centre of Metropolis provides some of the film's most striking images. 

Look past its impressive visuals and lofty cinematic influences, however, and there's simply not enough narrative and thematic craft within Rintaro's film to recommend it as highly as other Japanese animated features of the same period. Metropolis was released in the same year as Studio Ghibli's Spirited Away, and Rintaro's film is consistently outstripped in terms of character and storytelling when placed side by side with that of Hayao Miyazaki. 

Metropolis was released as a limited edition Dual Format Blu-ray & DVD steelbook on Monday 16th January 2017. A special edition Dual Format Blu-ray & DVD will be released on Monday 13th March 2017.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Nocturnal Animals - Cinema Review

'Edward has spent nineteen years writing a novel to unpick his past relationship. Has hand delivered it to his ex-wife. And has played with her reactions and emotions to a degree that includes ignoring her phone calls.'

Nocturnal Animals is a film that will inspire complex reactions, which is my way of saying that my initial Twitter post may not have told the full story of how I feel about the film. A day after viewing and I am still thinking about a film I ostensibly didn't like, but did respect. Amy Adams reacting for the audience, when she reaches a violent part of the book Edward Sheffield (Jake Gyllenhaal) has written for her, has stayed with me. The question around how righteous and how fair the anger Sheffield feels is, has stayed with me, despite my initial feeling that it was deeply unjustified. The question of whether Sheffield's novel is even designed as Susan (Adams) takes it also remains.

Perhaps the latter is the biggest reason for musing on the film at length, and for that respect growing into something which entices a second viewing. Receiving Edward's proof of his novel in her mailbox, nineteen years after they separated, Susan immediately cuts herself on the packaging. It's an overly obvious sign from director Tom Ford and Susan takes it as such: this is something here to do violence to her. With a philandering husband (Armie Hammer) away on business, Susan sets about reading. The on-page action also takes place in a parallel narrative depicted by Ford on screen.

Susan takes the novel personally, as it is clearly intended, but she does so with the feeling that it is an assault upon her, righteously picking at the guilt she feels. There is an argument though that the novel explores Edward's guilt as well. In the fictional story, Tony Hastings (also Gyllenhaal) is unable to protect his family from unwanted attention (and far worse things). In real life Susan appears to tell Edward that he is weak, leading partially to their separation. The novel, even if you accept Susan as ultimate subject, at least partially unpicks Edward's guilt surrounding his actual or perceived weakness.

Still, that does little to change the fact that Edward has spent nineteen years writing a novel to unpick his past relationship. Has hand delivered it to his ex-wife. And has played with her reactions and emotions to a degree that includes ignoring her phone calls. The final scene is again ambiguous (think about it: do we know for certain what's happening here?) but if it is to be taken at face value then Edward's 'revenge' seems cruel and petty indeed. Plentiful scenes are shot by Ford like a Horror film; and that's before you consider the fictional narrative, which is as much Horror as it is Thriller, tensely realised by the director.

Those scenes hint at a future for Ford beyond this because, despite the film's merits, it does once again deal with the neuroses and inescapable bourgeois pasts of the one per cent. Susan's pristine house, which she wanders through emptily, has more than a passing resemblance to Colin Firth's in a single man. The depiction of Edward's book here shows that Ford can move from this to dusty redneck abduction. He needs to move to something.

For the time though this will do nicely. If Ford takes another seven years to make his next film it may prove enough time to unpick your reaction to some of the material on offer here. At worst, it gives ample time to admire the performances. Nocturnal Animals is worth seeing for Adams and Aaron Taylor-Johnson alone, plus another one of those supporting turns from Michael Shannon.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Morgan - Blu-ray Review

'There's enough within Morgan to make both the film and its director's future worth watching'.

As a directorial debut, Morgan is caught somewhere between lingering feelings of shameless nepotism (you may have heard of director Luke Scott's father Ridley, who just happens to have a producer credit) and the promise of future potential. Whilst the younger Scott has clearly picked up something of the elder's eye for a pleasing shot - the opening aerial views of a coastline and a bridge cleverly made to appear uncannily alien attest to that - there's also a distinct feeling that his film might lack some of its more impressive attributes if he weren't the son of the man who directed Blade Runner.

For starters, Morgan boasts a cast the average Oscar contender would envy. Brian Cox, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Paul Giamatti and Toby Jones are all here among other reliable talents, lending Scott's debut some serious weight in the acting department which you suspect might not be there without his dad's involvement. Whilst it's somewhat frustrating that some of the roles for the big names are little more than extended cameos, the film undoubtedly benefits overall from their presence, with Dr. Shapiro's (Giamatti) appearance in a central scene opposite Morgan (Anya Taylor-Joy) arguably the film's strongest sequence.

Scott instead leans more heavily on younger, less established players to fill the prominent roles in his debut, a decision which bears mixed results. Twenty-year-old Taylor-Joy, who turned heads with her breakthrough performance in The Witch last year and is nominated for the Rising Star Award at this year's BAFTAs, puts in a comprehensively strong turn combining her already proven ability for unsettling supernatural fare with some impressive action sequences opposite Kate Mara in the lead role. In comparison to Taylor-Joy, however, the rest of Scott's less established cast members are satisfactory at best and struggle to make any sort of impression, although the somewhat hokey dialogue from Seth Owen rarely gives them a great deal to work with.

Owen's ideas are also problematic, in that there's little here which hasn't been done before. The central premise of an outsider testing an artificial human is strongly reminiscent of 2015's Ex Machina, whilst the shady scientific research company behind Morgan feels as though it could be a subsidiary of Weyland-Yutani. But, whilst the script might not be that original, Scott makes it work by injecting mystery and tension in the right places; clandestine allusions to "Helsinki", a prior incident left almost entirely unexplained, work particularly well. The plot become both less interesting and a little too dour during the action-oriented final act - a decision not helped by some irritatingly choppy editing from Scott - but there's enough within Morgan to make both the film and its director's future worth watching.
 

Morgan was released on UK Blu-ray and DVD on Monday 9th January 2017.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

The Walk - Blu-ray Review

'Gordon-Levitt is an actor increasingly known for fairly unsubtle performances and, as such, he's perfect for showman Petit... if only Zemeckis hadn't layered the film with an equal amount of loudness to complement it.'

If you've seen The Walk by now, or even its trailer, then you'll be aware that star Joseph Gordon-Levitt speaks with a French accent. Picture, if you will for a second, that your non-French friend turns round and affects a French accent. It's perhaps likely to be done for comedic effect and sound at least a little silly, maybe even pretentious.

Your ability to enjoy The Walk therefore rests for the most part in how soon you can get over JGL's performance, something not generally aided by Robert Zemeckis' direction, which plays up the 'Frenchness' of Philippe Petit (Gordon-Levitt) in a way only an American eye could. Yes, this is a film featuring a mime performance and sundry cavorting around attractive French streets. Gordon-Levitt is an actor increasingly known for fairly unsubtle performances and, as such, he's perfect for showman Petit... if only Zemeckis hadn't layered the film with an equal amount of loudness to complement it. The effect is that Petit's desire to walk between the Twin Towers seems almost frivolous for a time; funny and twee rather than daring.

Though that is a problem with the film, the other major problem in the composition here comes the fact that The Walk is shot in 3D. It's a largely unheralded factor of the 3D fad that shooting a film in this way changes a director's style. Auteur theory becomes less relevant and '3D theory' settles in. There are shots in The Walk, for example, that stand out as unusual; for Zemeckis or anyone else, but because they serve the 3D - zooming into and out of things, whizzing the camera closer than usual to objects - they make the cut. This will be 3D's greatest legacy. In however many years time it takes for us to move on from it you will still be able to look back at a technology which fundamentally imprinted itself on how film's are shot.

All of which says that The Walk has little to offer but, in fact, in amongst some of the obvious missteps and somewhat bizarre presentation, there resides a formulaically fun film, wrestled into a heist-like structure by Zemeckis. JGL's frivolous lead is backed up by people who lend things a bit more heft (notably James Badge Dale, late on) and after the history of Petit is dispensed with and the plan starts to build, The Walk becomes an well-wrangled Thriller.

It also features a bravura sequence involving the execution of the walk itself, which sees the film achieve its payoff where it so easily could have registered a disappointing damp squib. Yes, the pretentiousness of Petit and the treatment of his feat is hard to take sometimes, mainly because it is rammed down your throat from all angles. But when the performer is simply allowed to perform, when Zemeckis gives him attention rather than Attention, the film does find a level of beauty and philosophical splendour that wasn't always apparent in the early running.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

The Young Pope: Season One - Blu-ray Review

'Whilst there are parallels between this series and the political machinations of both House Of Cards and The West Wing before it, Sorrentino owes just as much to both The Sopranos and the gangland cinema of Scorsese'.

The title sequence seen that opens most of the ten episodes in The Young Pope's first season sees Lenny Belardo (Jude Law), the titular pontiff known as Pius XIII, stride past religious artwork from across the centuries before turning to the camera to give a Frank Underwood-style wink to the audience. It's an isolated fourth wall break which initially suggests that the aim of Paolo Sorrentino's inaugural television series is to create a Vatican City version of Netflix's House Of Cards.

Had the writer and director set out to do just that then The Young Pope would almost certainly have turned out to be a perfectly enjoyable watch. Whilst there are parallels between this series and the political machinations of both House Of Cards and The West Wing before it, Sorrentino owes just as much to both The Sopranos and the gangland cinema of Scorsese.

That said, whilst the director is clearly happy to present the Catholic Church as being just as populated by unscrupulous and self-serving individuals as any large organisation, legitimate or otherwise, the series never becomes an attack on religion per se. On the contrary, Sorrentino offers a refreshing balance, highlighting the positive nature of worship upon people around the world in several episodes. Just as in life, faith is not the enemy here, but the people using it to further their own influence and agendas.

What sets The Young Pope apart from being just another story of Machiavellian power struggles are the regularly more surreal elements included by Sorrentino. From the first episode's opening dream sequence onwards, the director delights in keeping the audience guessing as to just how much of what we're seeing is actually happening and how much is in Lenny's mind. The Lynchian elements throughout keep matters compelling, even if they undoubtedly result in occasions throughout the series where you're not entirely sure of what is going on.

The unorthodox narrative approach adopted by Sorrentino throughout has a similar effect, as the director regularly leaves some of his many plot threads untouched for episodes at a time. Whilst a few struggle to get the development they need over the ten installments as a result, almost all add something to the series overall - only one minor subplot feels surplus to requirements thanks in part to a cheap clandestine epilogue rather than a proper resolution.

Helping to power through the relatively more bewildering and occasionally weaker elements is the consistently captivating performance from Law. The series' very best moments are those which showcase the actor's commanding presence as Lenny: his first address to the cardinals, his withering takedown of the Italian Prime Minister, and his many mordant exchanges with his Secretary Of State Cardinal Voiello (Silvio Orlando) amongst others. That Sorrentino's cast is littered with superb actors from across both Europe and the US, including Hollywood veterans Diane Keaton and James Cromwell, makes it all the more impressive that Law in the title role continually stands head and shoulders above them all.

The Young Pope: Season One was released on UK Blu-ray, DVD and digital download on Monday 26th December 2016.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Our Kind Of Traitor - Blu-ray Review

'It's as much Spy Kids as it is serious espionage Drama.'

After the success of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, some level of resurgence for the John le Carré adaptation was inevitable. An adaptation of one of his more recent works, Our Kind Of Traitor, makes sense though the way this film came about - in a seemingly rushed production and with a director (Susanna White) mainly known for TV work - hints that maybe more care could have been taken if the success of the previous adaptation was to have been repeated.

As it is, Our Kind Of Traitor is an OK Thriller, far from the polished production of Tinker, Tailor. A large part of the problem is in the plotting. Le Carré seems on less sure footing in the contemporary setting and his long repeated refrain that good men will ultimately do the right thing feels an empty message for our times. Hossein Amini, on screenwriting duties, fails to give the narrative the on-screen impetus it is desperately crying out for. There's no real motivation for Perry (Ewan McGregor) to carry a foreign object onto a plane for Dima (Stellan Skarsgård) and you can only sort of understand how and why his wife (Naomie Harris) comes around to sympathise as well. Muddled parallels between Perry and Dima's family situations are clumsy and hardly the work of a sophisticated subtext.

Perry and Gail aren't really your typical Le Carré protagonists either and it shows. As the 'everymen' of the story they behave irrationally far too often, to get swept up in a world that's beyond them. It's as much Spy Kids as it is serious espionage Drama. An alternative is offered in the shape of Damian Lewis' Hector, working without the permission of his boss Billy (Mark Gatiss) and against an MP; the impossibly named Aubrey Longrigg (Jeremy Northam). Hector though rarely gets the focus he needs and even his 'moment', taking it to Longrigg in his own home, feels a little flat.

The performances are also far too broad to anchor the film in the seriousness of le Carré's world. McGregor, long-haired and non-too-subtle, is never one to underplay and he's joined by a Skarsgård performance that is one part ridiculous sincerity, five parts vodka-swilling Russian henchman. Everyone, in fact, seems to feel as though they are owed a slice of scenery-shaped cake on which to have a good masticate. A more stiff-upper lipped villain than Northam you would struggle to find.

The conclusion also eventually sacrifices a lot of tension by opting for at least one obvious character moment; a repeated refrain in a film which often passes the time, sometimes in a satisfying manner, but never once really surprises or elevates its source to the ranks we know le Carré can reach.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Sunset Song - Blu-ray Review

'The story is variously described as a coming of age drama, but that only tells half of the story. This is a tale interwoven with the harshness and the beauty of the Scottish landscape; the warmth of families, the danger of a haunting storm.'

Adapted from Lewis Grassic Gibbon's classic (and wonderful) novel, Terence Davies' Sunset Song is both a delightful realisation and something which falls into some of the obvious traps of its source. That it's here though in the current film environment is a bit of a wonder. Davies seems to be continuing to pride himself on tackling challenging material, without obvious 'fashionable' appeal nor the correct budgetary price point for current funding tastes. His next production, A Quiet Passion, is a biopic of American poet Emily Dickinson, which runs to over two hours and has little true 'star power'.

Long may he continue in such ventures. Sunset Song, as per the source, tells the story of Chris Guthrie (Agyness Deyn), resident of a small Scottish farm with, throughout the course of the film, various members of family. During the course of the story Chris encounters a number of changes, losses and hardships, as per par for the course of rural Scotland in the early 1900s. The story is variously described as a coming of age drama, but that only tells half of the story. This is a tale interwoven with the harshness and the beauty of the Scottish landscape; the warmth of families, the danger of a haunting storm.

That balance is within Gibbon's prose and Davies borrows it with abandon. The sweetness of the language balances the sour notes of the plot; the opening of the film is like a beautiful, lyrical nightmare. Early on in the film Chris' younger brother announces the arrival of the doctor and Davies shoots it echoing over the mountains, like the proclamation of a spirit by the children from Haneke's The White Ribbon.

The constant through-line in the film, no matter whether Davies is going extremely lyrical or a bit more pragmatic, is Chris. She is one of the foremast characters of British literature; a heroine with oomph, but also character and developed direction; agency personified. Deyn is perfect. Chris feels vulnerable, as she should, but throughout the trauma you never feel as though she does not have the power to pull through. Davies is wise to the character's power. Little moments, such as her offering her hand to love interest Ewan (Kevin Guthrie), rather than the other way around, are spot on.

Davies too shoots with a respect for the gorgeous landscape but with a recognition that Chris is the way to connect with it. Unlike close recent genre cousin Far From The Madding Crowd, Sunset Song lives in shots of people; in the mid-range and close-up. There's barely a shot of a landscape without a character creeping in at some point. A shot in a church late on almost magnetically gravitates towards the priest in the pulpit, heading down the aisle before veering left. It's the perfect depiction of Davies' interest in character over scenery.

But those obvious traps. In a film so honest, quite how Davies manages to fall into cheese at at least two moments is hard to fully understand. The birth of a baby and the announcement of war are handled with all the tenderness of pruning rose bushes with chainsaws. There's also a really grand struggle with a late character change in Ewan too. It doesn't entirely work on a character basis in the novel either, but on film it really doesn't work. A lot here does though. On many an occasion it is a near note-perfect, sweeping marvel.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Donnie Darko: The Director's Cut - Blu-ray Review

'Kelly's inclusion of new elements feels more like the director attempting to paper over some of the cracks in his previous flawed execution, with limited success'.

There's an argument which continues to rage amongst Donnie Darko's cult following over whether the 2004 Director's Cut improves upon the Theatrical Cut released in 2001, or whether it pales in comparison to the original. Those who prefer the earlier version of Richard Kelly's film say that the twenty minutes of material added by the director in the revised edition remove much of the ambiguity within the narrative to the film's detriment. Fans of the Director's Cut, meanwhile, appreciate being able to see a version closer to that screened by Kelly at Sundance in 2001 as well as the depth added to a number of characters through the added material.

As a newcomer to any version of Donnie Darko, my feelings fall somewhere in the middle. There are numerous reinstated scenes within the Director's Cut which add some much needed development to secondary characters such as Karen Pomeroy (Drew Barrymore) and Eddie Darko (Holmes Osborne). That said, there are still quite a few who Kelly leaves somewhat thinly drawn: whilst the mystery surrounding Roberta Sparrow (Patience Cleveland), for example, is initially intriguing, come the end of the film she is left as one of several sketchily developed figures within Kelly's film.

The director's decision to add passages from in-film book "The Philosophy Of Time Travel" to the Director's Cut is perhaps the one which garners the most ire from Darko devotees. From one perspective it's not hard to see why. Ignoring the fact that they don't appear in the Theatrical Cut, the superimposed pages still constantly feel like an awkward fit, more often than not becoming an unnecessary distraction rather than the expository device Kelly apparently intended. However, claims that they damage the film through removing the possibility of more than one interpretation of just what is happening to Donnie (Jake Gyllenhaal) are hyperbolic. In truth, Kelly's inclusion of new elements such as these feels more like the director attempting to paper over some of the cracks in his previous flawed execution, with limited success.

Whilst Donnie Darko remains an intriguing and for the most part engaging watch thanks to the perplexing and convoluted puzzle at its core, too often Kelly's shortcomings as both a storyteller and director hold his ideas back. That the film is able to overcome these problems is largely thanks to the talented cast, made up of future stars at the start of their career - Gyllenhaal in particular alongside older sister Maggie - in company with established names such as Barrymore and Patrick Swayze. Whether or not the Director's Cut is superior to the Theatrical Cut, meanwhile, is ultimately a moot point: as each version has areas of relative strength over the other, there's an argument to be made that it's only through watching both cuts that you'll be able to get the most out of Kelly's film.

Donnie Darko: The Director's Cut was released alongside the Theatrical Cut in a 4-Disc Limited Edition Dual Format Blu-ray & DVD boxset on Monday 12th December 2016. 

The 2-Disc Limited Edition Blu-ray (Director's and Theatrical Cuts) and 1-Disc DVD (Theatrical Cut) are released on Monday 9th January 2017.

By Ben Broadribb. Ben is a contributing editor at Film Intel. He is normally seen in the wild wearing t-shirts containing obscure film references. When he's not writing about films here, Ben is usually writing about films - mostly Shakespeare adaptations - for his MA by Research. He's also on Google+ and Twitter.

Sausage Party - DVD Review

'Because, even given all of the film's cleverness, this still feels aimed at frat boys wearing chinos and Ralph Lauren polos to get high to and laugh at, whilst missing the majority of the jokes.'

There is a war going on at the creative heart of Sausage Party which will be all too familiar to those who have followed the writing careers of Seth Rogen and his most frequent collaborator, Evan Goldberg (here Kyle Hunter and Ariel Shaffir also have writing credits).

The battle, which visibly plays out on screen, goes something like this. Sausage Party has very erudite, very clever, very funny ideas, which are developed by Rogen and Goldberg (and realised with wonderfully vivid direction by Greg Tiernan and Conrad Vernon). So, in Sausage Party, a film about anthropomorphic foodstuffs, the writers manage to include this deep undercurrent of social conscience, cleverly blending the politics of the day with, erm, the inclusive politics of food. Bear with me.

Those ideas are most fully realised in the relationship between Sammy (Ed Norton doing Woody Allen), a Jewish bagel, and Kareem Abdul Lavash (Dave Krumholtz), a Palestinian flatbread. Ripe with undertone, the miss-matched pairing could have supported a film in their own right as they propose opposing ideas and mock each others culture before arriving at a conclusion approaching mutual respect and well... other things. More on that shortly.

Meanwhile, not content merely with the union of flatbread and bagel, Rogen and Goldberg's script is peppered (sorry) with foodstuff-centric socio-politicising that both gets a laugh and makes a point. 'We were driven out of our home by a bunch of Goddamn crackers!', wails Firewater (Bill Hader), a Native American alcoholic beverage. There's a recurring joke about a group of Nazi food who have interpreted the sacred words about 'the great beyond' in the wrong way and slipped far right material into otherwise 'religious' doctrine. A scene where flour doubles for the fog of war perhaps doesn't have the political points, but it is a perfectly well-observed piece of visual comedy.

There is though another side to Sausage Party, a side which feels like Rogen and Goldberg are almost daring their critics to roll out the same lines they've used to previously critique their shtick. Because, even given all of the above, this still feels like a film aimed at frat boys wearing chinos and Ralph Lauren polos to get high to and laugh at, whilst missing the majority of the jokes.

So, of course, there is a scene where Rogen's character, Frank, gets stoned for no plot-based purpose whatsoever. Barry (Michael Cera), Frank's friend, who makes it to the outside and finds out the truth about food, finds himself at the mercy of a drug-addled layabout, of course voiced by James Franco. The final scenes feature an extended Team America-esque segment of animated sex (yes, with food), funny for about a fifth of the screen time it is given.

And then, right before the film finishes, Rogen and Goldberg go meta again and, even in an animation, the former manages to find a way to get his face on the screen. This kind of meta joke has been dead a while now, but that doesn't stop the writers from sticking the blade in up to the hilt and twisting without mercy.

The feeling Sausage Party produces then is one of frustration. The war between the cleverness of Rogen and Goldberg and their continued desire to fall into tired tropes and cliches has been raging for some time now. Sausage Party suggests that it will be some time before it is over.

Sausage Party is released on UK Blu-ray and DVD on Monday December 26th 2016.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.

Florence Foster Jenkins - Blu-ray Review

'You can't shake the feeling that you're watching something at least semi-concerned with the fragile egos of the 1%.'

For a decade now Stephen Frears and real-life Drama has equalled Oscar interest. Whatever you think about what might be considered the director's lesser works the majority of Frears' films do have a relatively consistent look and feel to them. A dedication to straight storytelling, shot through with the candour of British brusqueness. A colour and look that is almost as much day time TV as it is big budget movie. Frears doesn't attract the auteur label, probably because we like to think of auteurism as looking a little bit smarter than this, but the fact that his films manage to be recognisably his films suggest that he isn't far removed from the criteria.

Florence Foster Jenkins, currently in the middle of its own awards push, is another Frears film very much in the mould of the director's previous offerings. It can't escape the problems that those offerings have come with, but there is something new here too.

Frears, here dealing with the titular New York socialite (Meryl Streep), who herself is dealing with an inability to sing, finds within this film a welcome touch of character ambiguity. Come the finale some things have happened (most, it must be said, of rather small import), but the blame for those things remains largely unallocated. Florence herself is naive and too far removed from the world she wants to play to to get any sort of grip on a level of reality. Her philandering husband, St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), clearly panders too much to her whims and needs in pursuit of finding for her a cloistered satisfaction that can never exist when shared with a reactionary public. That public too, Frears turning the camera on us, reacts like a rabbit in the headlights. Should they encourage Florence because she's a trier (as suggested by one character, who undergoes a farcical turnaround during the film), or unveil the truth that her skills are lacking?

There's some engaging material here then and the film's willingness to present each character in turn as deeply flawed, whilst still giving them gently comedic lines, shows the director's continuing and welcome dedication to populism and entertainment.

But, like Florence herself, there is a lack of serious depth here which just leaves the film skating on thin thematic ice. The conflict is to do with whether anyone will find out that Florence is really a rubbish singer. Greater stakes there have surely been, even in lesser morsels. Christian McKay shows up at a couple of points as a journalist threatening to 'out' the lead. In another film, he would be the hero; a bastion of the free press, who refuses St Clair's bribes to cut to the truth. Here he's the villain. You can't shake the feeling that you're watching something at least semi-concerned with the fragile egos of the 1%. The characters are charming, as you might expect, but they are also almost furiously empty and Frears never finds a depth that might have lifted them and his film to more substance.

By Sam Turner. Sam is editor of Film Intel, and can usually be found behind a keyboard with a cup of tea. He likes entertaining films and dislikes the other kind. He's on Google+, Twitter and several places even he doesn't yet know about.