• Most new users don't bother reading our rules. Here's the one that is ignored almost immediately upon signup: DO NOT ASK FOR FANEDIT LINKS PUBLICLY. First, read the FAQ. Seriously. What you want is there. You can also send a message to the editor. If that doesn't work THEN post in the Trade & Request forum. Anywhere else and it will be deleted and an infraction will be issued.
  • If this is your first time here please read our FAQ and Rules pages. They have some useful information that will get us all off on the right foot, especially our Own the Source rule. If you do not understand any of these rules send a private message to one of our staff for further details.
  • Please read our Rules & Guidelines

    Read BEFORE posting Trades & Request

A few reviews

I'd have to disagree about the Spielberg/Lucas theory as from the amount of the film that was shot in a soundstage and it's incredibly bland cinematography, I think Spielberg just didn't want to do the film and put in too much effort and was probably focused more on one of his other projects he was working on at the time. I think you're probably right that it was a Spielberg and Lucas problem in that this was a story that only Lucas really wanted to make, and the others just finally relented and did it.

I wish we had gotten at least one film in the 90s, even the crazy monkey king story that was proposed might have fared well under a Spielberg who was still at the top of his game and a Lucas that hadn't yet become obsessed with CGI. Shame we'll never know, but I just hope Dial of Destiny delivers a fitting farewell for Ford. They'll never top the ending of The Last Crusade, but hopefully Ford has one last great performance in him.
 
Alan Partridge Live: Stratagem (2023)
As an obsessed Alan Partridge fan (to a point where I worry it might be a debilitating mental condition... like Toblerone addiction) it was lovely stuff to see this latest live show suddenly appear on Amazon Prime, when I didn't even know it had been filmed. It's probably the least funny bit of Partridge media in quite some time if I'm honest but I still laughed all the way through. I had fun imagining what things Alan had been watching, which had made him think this show was a good idea, probably a TED talk and 'Hamilton'. Unlike some of Alan's other shows, books and podcasts, I can't see myself rewatching this to the point where I can quote lines and anecdotes from it to apply to almost any real life situation. On the whole, a very good effort, seven on ten.



Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa (2013)
The much delayed Alan Partridge movie was far, far better than most sitcom-to-movie adaptations ever usually are but it still slightly fell below "peak Partridge" for me. It's the mundane minutiae of Alan's ridiculous life that I enjoy most, so the more the movie leans away from that and into cinematic action and drama the less well it works. But Alan trying to exploit a workplace hostage situation to inflate his ego and celebrity profile is about as great an idea for this character as a movie script could get. A laugh-out-loud 90-minutes of excruciatingly awkward comedy.

 
Boiling Point (2021)

330px-Boiling_Point_poster.jpg


Just about any 92-minute film captured in a single take (yes, really - no stitched shots or tricks) is bound to be technically impressive, but does it work dramatically, and would it be roughly as good if the same script were produced without said gimmick? In the case of Boiling Point, a BAFTA Best British Film nominee, the answers are most definitely affirmative. The script, about a nerve-wracking night at a mid-level prestige restaurant around Christmastime, is taught and propulsive, the performances are excellent, and the direction/photography are varied and fluid enough that the single-take format never feels like a limitation. (Having the shot/film climax with the lead character's heart attack, meanwhile, is a rock-solid narrative justification for what could have been a gimmicky exercise in mere technical showmanship.) So, if you haven't yet seen it, fire up your projector, make sure you've got 100 minutes without distractions on deck, and throw Boiling Point on the grill!

Grade: A-
 
Lynch/Oz (2022)
Alexandre O. Philippe film documentaries have become essential viewing and seem increasingly unusual in their focus and form (in a very good way), since he made 'The People vs. George Lucas'. This 7th(?) film explores the compelling connections between the work of David Lynch and the 1939 musical 'The Wizard of Oz'. It's devided into chapters narrated by other film-makers who talk about how their own life and work relates to the film and to Lynch. It's a totally absorbing essay which makes me want to revisit all of Lynch's work again, with a fresh perspective, especially the films I didn't particularly care for. I wasn't expecting the delightful bonus of having John Waters be one of the voices speaking about 'Lynch/Oz'.

Just one nitpick... Since Lynch's 1984 adaptation of 'Dune' has been one of my favourite films since childhood, I was a little disappointed that it only gets mentioned once. It's also rich with Oz allusions, so I'll point out some of the more obvious ones here. Paul (the movie's Dorothy) clutches a Toto sized dog as he crosses over into Oz/Arrakis and I doubt it was a coincidence that Lynch choose a band called Toto for the score. Lynch depicts the Baron in an emerald city, flying around and cackling like a witch and like Dorothy's house, the Baron is swept up into a giant storm. Of course there are literal witches too, Lady Jessica being the good and Mohiam being the bad. You could also see the portrayal of Shadout Mapes and Alia as the nods to the Munchkins. Thufir Hawat, Duncan Idaho and Stilgar could be interpreted as Paul's Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Man companions.



Tár (2022)
A thoroughly satisfying film on all artistic levels. Powerful performances, framed in the intimate and the epic by (far and away) the best Cinematography this year (courtesy of Florian Hoffmeister and Director Todd Field). For once, a film that actually looks well shot and lit is nominated for the Oscar (go on, surprise me, give it the award!). I was as adsorbed in the restricted greys, blacks, whites and wooden shades of the film's colour palette, as I was by the drama of the story. The thorny issues it tackles are handled thoughtfully and with nuance. The line between a person being corrupted by power and a corrupt person exploiting the power is drawn very thin. 'Tár' is refreshingly short on exposition, confidant enough to drop you into this world with no explanation of the archaic conventions of orchestra internal politics, or technicalities of the craft. 2 & 1/2 hours flies by so easily.

 
Turning Red (2022)
Due to the cacophonous, hyperactive irritation of the opening, where it feels like the film-makers where afraid that if a single second was not occupied by a screaming voice-over trying to rush through the exposition, jabbering zany irritating characters jumping up and down trying to introduce themselves, or just frenetic cuts, the viewer would get bored. Thankfully it does eventually settle down into a reasonably pleasant film but it had a hard job fully winning me back. The big wobbly furry red CGI panda FX are unfeasibly cute and smile inducing. I'm neither Canadian, nor somebody who was 13 in 2002 but I wasn't that much older, yet I found the presentation confusing, the kids sound like 2022 kids to me, and nothing like the kids I knew when I was that age. So I didn't get why it needed to be a 2002 period piece. It was also hard to feel excited for/with the four girls to go to a concert by a shallow, manufactured boy band, which they'd doubtless have forgotten about, a few years after the events of this film. I found the laziness of the plotting to be a drag at some points e.g. we need the girls to buy tickets to the massive pop concert on the night, even though that would never happen, because that's what we need to make the plot work and we can't be bothered to write something better. 'Turning Red' is generally fine but it's starting to feel like quite a while since Pixar regularly made films that were a lot more than just fine.


I enjoyed the film more vicariously through lovely Canadian YouTubers Simone & George who were more appreciative of the specific references to Canada in the 2000s and Chinese-Canadian culture:

 
Last edited:
This Is England '86 (2010)
The first of the TV mini-series continuations of the 'This Is England' film seamlessly flows from where it ended but with a few years in between for our characters to find themselves in new places. The first two episodes were not directed by Shane Meadows himself (although he did write them) and they have a much more goofy and comedic tone, which I found a little jarring after the sombre conclusion to the first film. Meadows takes over for the last two episodes and they immediately hit that sweet spot between comedy and tragedy again. Episode three has one of the most disturbing and horrifying rape scenes I've seen on the screen but it's not because it's very violent and or very graphic. I think it's the suburban mundanity of it that makes it seem so awfully real and the way Meadows films it from standing eye level, as if you're in the room looking down watching but unable to do anything to stop it. I felt a bit sick for an hour afterwards, it's powerful, empathetic film-making for sure. Vicky McClure, Joe Gilgun, Thomas Turgoose and all the ensemble cast are sensational. It's cool to see the young actors age in "real time" as the years in the story go by.

 
A highly enjoyable double bill of Michelle Yeoh's first starring movie and her latest...


Yes, Madam! aka Police Assassins aka Police Assassins II aka In the Line of Duty I (1985)
There were two things I was excited to see on Eureka! video's new blu-ray of 'Yes, Madam!', 1. Michelle Yeoh and Cynthia Rothrock's insane fight scenes in HD and 2. Yeoh and Rothrock in a Hong Kong version of a '48 Hrs.' style Hollywood "buddy cop" movie. It 100% delivered on the first element, any time the two are on screen, your jaw is gonna be on the floor, as Yeoh flips through a glass panel, or Rothrock springs off a wall. The 2nd element was a let down, there is barely any time given over to actually developing the "bad cop, badder cop" relationship between the two. At least 50% of the runtime is instead devoted to comedy shenanigans involving three hapless thieves who get mixed up in the chase for a microfilm "MacGuffin". As funny as Mang Hoi, John Shum and Tsui Hark are in these scenes, I could never stop counting down the minutes until we got back to what Yeoh and Rothrock were doing.

For the record, I watched the original Hong Kong theatrical cut, with the theatrical Cantonese mono mix but the disc also includes an "export" cut with dubbed English (and several other audio options), which bizarrely open with a scene from a different movie, so I might watch that next time for a laugh.



Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)
Like the 'Dimension Jump' episode of Sci-Fi sitcom 'Red Dwarf', meets 'The Inquisitor' and 'Back to Reality' episodes of 'Red Dwarf', but with the budget and scope of 'The Matrix', and like it was written by Douglas Adams and Directed by Terry Gilliam. 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' is made up of four elements, a beautifully played family drama, a Kung Fu action flick, an outrageous comedy and a multiverse Sci-Fi movie. I thought it had too little of the first two and too much of the last one but it's still a blast. Despite all the snorting of flies, waving of dildos and hot dog finger romance, it was one emotional shot of Stephanie Hsu's face, sitting in her car, after her mother has once again let her down badly. which really stuck in my mind. It's her giving one of the performances of the year but then she spends the rest of the movie goofing off in wacky comedy scenes. It's precisely because the domestic drama is done so well, that I wanted more focus on it. All the cast are terrific, let's have more films with Ke Huy Quan in them please. He sort of plays three (I think) distinct roles, so changes his tone of voice and the way he stands, so we always know which it is and react to them differently but always with empathy for their own different problems of unrequited love. Despite some criticisms, I'd have to give 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' full marks for it's heroic levels of creativity alone.

I demand that producers the Russo brothers use their clout to inverse-George Lucas all the 'Guardians of the Galaxy' Marvel movies and replace astonishing CGI Rocket racoon, with hilariously janky puppet Raccacoonie. I laughed so hard every time that thing was on screen.

 
The Snowman (1982)
I don't think I'd seen this Raymond Briggs Christmas classic since the 80s. I watched with the David Bowie intro because that's what was readily available and what I remembered. The animation is a lot more basic and janky than I remembered but still beautiful and unique in it's impressionist pastel style. Howard Blake's music is lovely, conveying the emotions of the story without dialogue, or sound.

All three intros are on YouTube but I think the Bowie one is best:





The Snowman and the Snowdog (2012)
The mix of jerky 2D hand-drawn and smooth digital/3D animation for this belated Raymond Briggs sequel was a bit jarring at times. The new score by Ilan Eshkeri and the drummer from Razorlight is inferior. Apparently the original famed composer Howard Blake (who has scored for Ridley Scott) was happy to return but was asked to submit a demo to earn the job, so he told them to basically f**k off. Having said all that, I did nearly blub at the end, when the kid and the dog watch the Snowman melt (again).



The Bear (1998)
'The Bear's magical score by 'The Snowman' composer Howard Blake, was rather lacking in the actual 2012 sequel 'The Snowman and the Snowdog'. I liked that they didn't completely anthropomorphise the Polar Bear, this aspect and the flying bear spectre god, Frith-type, thing, reminded me of 'Watership Down'. I might've even preferred this to 'The Snowman', maybe just because it was new to me.

 
This Is England '88 (2011)
I was waiting in glee for Woody to finally explode under the tension of living with his oppressively middle-of-the-road/charm-offensive parents and new girlfriend. Like so much in the series, it doesn't go the way you expect and is far more powerful. Vicky McClure's Lol is going through depression and terrifying waking nightmares after the events of 'This Is England '86'. I've watched McClure for years in the excellent police procedural 'Line of Duty' but I didn't think she was that remarkable (delivering a lot of police technical jargon at pace) but in 'This Is England '88' she is on the level of the greatest actors ever put on film. Some of her scenes are soul shattering. The scene with her and Combo forgiving each other for their past hurtful actions was beautiful and so skilfully calls back to lines spoken in the first movie. This series is set over Christmas, so has that extra edge from the characters feeling warmer when they're with friends, or colder when they're alone.

 
War of the Worlds (2005)
I thought this was a bit "meh" when it came out, maybe I wanted it to be like 'Independence Day', or was comparing it to the Jeff Wayne version. This time I really dug it's un-Spielberg-like grim, miserable and unremittingly nihilistic, eye-level depiction of the alien apocalypse. I was appreciating the clever way Steven Spielberg films the alien threat indirectly, or at a distance, almost always glimpsed far off through smoke, reflected in some glass, or 2nd-hand on a TV screen. Where as he makes the resultant human threat of chaos, mass panic, violence, selfishness and murder feel very close and grubby. There are some post-911 elements that seem a bit dated to that specific era and unfortunately Spielberg pulls his punches right at the end. We don't get the dark, cynical ending that the preceding film deserves and he obviously couldn't resist having Tom Cruise's otherwise grounded and flawed "every man" do some heroics in the finale. A near perfect movie, until it wasn't but it was still good.

 
Ethel & Ernest (2016)
From what I remember of reading Raymond Briggs' 1998 comic book, this 94-minute BBC adaptation is extremely faithful. The same words and scenes are rendered in a beautiful recreation of Briggs' drawing style, as if it was used as a storyboard for the film. It's almost like an incredibly high-class motion-comic, with top class acting talent for the voices, including Jim Broadbent, Brenda Blethyn and Roger Allam. It's the real-life story of Briggs' parents from the moment they meet in the 1920s, until their deaths in the 1970s. It's also the tale of how a world changes in those decades, including wars, society and the advance of everyday technology. From horse-drawn carts, to men on the moon. Briggs interestingly draws himself as only a minor character in their simple story. At first I was thinking Ethel & Ernest were a bit too irrepressibly chipper and was looking forward to some drama entering their lives but by the end I was holding back the tears and wishing the drama would go away and time would stand still but of course it doesn't and it can't for any of us. I felt it had an underlying strong political message but it's played subtly enough that it could my imagination. Definitely one of the best hand-drawn animated films-for-adults ever made. If you are somebody who loved the more "grounded" films in the Studio Ghibli filmography, you'll love this too.


The late author did a BFI Q&A after seeing the film for the first time and is visibly crying from the emotion:

 
Is That Black Enough for You?!? (2022)
2-hours isn't enough time to cover the whole tapestry of African-American cinema but Director/Writer/Critic Elvis Mitchell has a good go anyway on this new Netflix documentary. When he moves away from that more general overview of the history, to making some cohesive points, it works best. The central thesis that the films made during the "Blaxploitation" era didn't just give black audiences what they'd been crying out for, it changed the way Hollywood made films for white audiences too. Showing the studio executives that people craved movie entertainment with bold, confidant protagonists, action and distinctive popular soundtracks. The cut-to John Travolta strutting down the street from 1977's 'Saturday Night Fever' makes Mitchell's point with sharp visual precision. It's often said that it was George Lucas and Steven Spielberg who changed Hollywood (for better or worse) but I reckon Melvin Van Peebles and Gordon Parks changed it first. Like all great film retrospectives, you come away with a list of movies you're excited to watch, or watch again.



Enola Holmes 2 (2022)
The first 'Enola Holmes' was my worst film of 2020, chiefly down to Millie Bobby Brown's hyper irritating idea to constantly break the 4th wall for no reason and at any given moment. But I'm a big Sherlock Holmes fan, so I decided to watch this new sequel anyway, out of morbid curiosity if nothing else. With my expectations at rock bottom, I was pleasantly surprised. At first the same 4th wall breaking was infuriating but thankfully Brown seems to forget to do it (in every scene/shot) once the plot starts to gather steam. The script it a really clever mystery concoction of real world events like the "Phossy Jaw" scandal, the Victorian political/social setting and established Holmes conventions. Brown and Louis Partridge's delightful chemistry works even better than it did in the first film. It felt like Henry Cavill's Sherlock was used more and more appropriately, as the cooler headed corrective to his headstrong young ward, pointing out factual clues, to counter her inspired theorising. He's portrayed as the more experienced, famous master detective but not in a way that diminishes her as the resourceful protagonist. I could have used way more of Cavill's drunk acting though because it was hilarious. The well written Moriarty reveal speech leaves me actually eager to see what they do with the character in further sequels.

 
The Sea Beast (2022)
Having heard nothing whatsoever about Netflix's 'The Sea Beast' I wasn't expecting to love it so much. The voice cast is stacked with incredible talent like Karl Urban, Jared Harris and Marianne Jean-Baptiste. The story is pretty much "Pirates vs Kaiju" and has the same level of quality you might expect if Studio Ghibli did that premise. You see Disney/Pixar, it is still possible to do CGI animation that is bright, bold and appealing, without it looking bland as f**k and making me wish it was hand-drawn 2D. The sea shanties are catchy, the jokes are very funny, the multi-generational drama is powerfully played, with subtle facial acting/animation and as a bonus, you could see the film as an allegory for the abolition of the international slave trade around the turn of 1800. I wasn't expecting an animated family adventure to feature Karl Urban shouting "You bollocksed it up!" to a little girl.



The Grandmaster (2013)
It's not a phrase I like but this was a case of "style over substance" for me. Wong Kar-wai's use of heavily coloured lights, smoke filled rooms, shallow focus, frequent use of close-ups but no establishing shots and hardly any exterior scenes, overwhelms the thin characterisations and minimalist plotting. At one point he points the camera at the reflection in a puddle, to avoid showing any scale or external activity directly. I'm sure he had his reasons for filming things like this but I didn't understand what they were. Sometimes the martial arts action scenes are glorious but at other points they too are overwhelmed by quick cutting and arty slowmo close-ups of raindrops. The style reminded me of a drama-documentary, where things are filmed to give a deliberately impressionistic flavour of events. There were some moments where the tragedy of Zhang Ziyi's character and her unrequited relationship with Tony Leung really worked it's magic. The music kept reminding me of something but I didn't realise what it was until it goes in to a full rendition of Ennio Morricone's sublime 'Deborah's Theme' from 'Once Upon a Time in America' toward the end.

This hip-hop trailer makes it look waaaay more exciting than it actually is:

 
This Is England '90 (2015)
It's so clever the way 'This Is England '90' brings elements from all the previous parts together in a way that suggest meticulous planning but surely Shane Meadows has been making this up across the 10-years since the first film. Sometimes when I'm watching something long, even a film I quite like, I might check my watch to see how much I've got to sit through but for 'This Is England '90' I was sadly looking at the vanishing minutes ahead and knowing when I got to the end, I'd have to say goodbye to these characters. Thankfully Meadows has suggested he will do a 'This Is England '00' (presumably filmed around 2025), which gives me some hope. This is about the power of forgiveness again, most of the characters end up happy, it's just the one who had the chance to forgive but didn't and so hasn't forgiven himself, who is left apart from the others. There is a Christ vibe to the way Stephen Graham's character arc resolves. Why did it take me so many years to watch this modern saga, when I knew it would be this damn good!

 
The Fablemans. I liked but didn’t love this movie. It’s no secret that this is a fictionalized autobiography for Spielberg. But it’s more than that. It works for me primarily because it doesn’t feel like a biopic. I’m not sure anyone is going to gain any insights into Spielberg’s success (spoiler warning) except that he really liked making movies when he was a kid. Stil, the bits of Sammy making his movies are some of the most enjoyable bits. But it had the effect of making me very aware of the visual tricks Spielberg uses throughout the rest of the movie, and indeed all his movies taking me out of this experience a little too often. It works best when examining the creative pull some feel but don’t fully give in to. This presents itself in various ways within the Fablemans to produce various family turmoil. When played straight this works very well. Unfortunately it often veers into almost sitcom-like comedy that didn’t work for me. And the teenage drama just didn’t feel genuine to me. I’m not sure if Spielberg was going for a Roma-type thing where it is portrayed more as his memory colors it than as it really happened, but it didn’t work for me. The acting is very good. Paul Dano is understated and amazing as always. But honestly it is Michelle Williams’s movie. It is one of the best movies of the year, but it is not among my very favorites.
 
A House Made of Splinters (2022)
An admirable documentary, incredibly powerful certainly but I was always distracted by the medium, over the message. The film-makers' decision to remove themselves from the film left me with too many questions. When you're intimately filming the tragic, fragile lives of children in a care home, I needed to understand the process for how this was achieved and where the boundaries were (if any). Otherwise it feels exploitative (even if it wasn't) because who gave meaningful consent for these lives to be filmed? Surely not the children themselves and not their alcoholic parents. Despite that, this is heartbreaking, often beautiful and hard to watch.

 
Interstellar Where We Are Going a fanedit by @futon88

First of all, what an amazing trailer! You will cry or you are of a frozen heart. That is one of the best fanedit trailers ever!

Interstellar is about Earth's last chance to find a habitable planet before a lack of resources causes the human race to go extinct.

Time and space. These two very important phenomenon have kept civilized beings pondering our vast infinite universe since the beginning of time. Indefinitely searching for a means to understand such remote interstellar destinations as our solar system, our galaxy, other planets, other stars and blackholes, etc.

Extremely talented editor, @futon88 flexes his top notch editing skills on this magnificent Science Fiction drama, which is very much about those very ideas.

Interstellar is arguably one of the best movies ever made, and certainly one of the best Science Fiction "what if?" movies ever made. So why edit it?

I was more than a little pessimistic when I learned that @futon88 was going to edit this excellent movie. A movie with a very important message. A movie that has one of the most heart-wrenching moments ever in a movie. A movie about finding a new home for a humanity facing certain extinction in an interstellar destination. An emotional Sci-Fi drama about an unbreakable relationship between father and daughter which has never been portrayed in a more memorable manner.

The centerpiece moment is when Cooper checks the logs of the twenty years that had passed on earth, and learns that his little girl is his age and remembers his promise to her that she will be his age when they meet again. She says that it's the right time to come back, dad. The emotional intensity of that moment is an unparalleled piece of art in cinematic history. That is but one of the profoundly emotional experiences emphasized in this edit.

@futon88 deftly cuts out only the most expendable and pointless parts of the movie (mostly from the unnecessary bloat on earth) with surgical precision.

What is truly amazing about this edit is what @futon88 chose to add. The sprinkling of the songs of Simon and Garfunkle are so well chosen and masterfully placed that you would swear that they were always meant to be there. And the end? My partner and her two friends balled their eyes out. I am ashamed to admit that I did, as well.

This edit may very likely cause us to question whether there is a future for humanity in our infinite universe. Hopefully, these contrived machinations could be glimpses of a great human effort which might unravel the secrets of an ambiguous universe. Perhaps, this edit allowed me to remember the secrets of an ever mysterious time and space which has shaped our lives in a more memorable and emotive way. In any case, presented in such an emotional way, it was a very memorable experience.

It's amazing that an almost perfect movie could be made better. A perfect ten across the board. A modern day science fiction drama masterpiece. I concur with @Wraith, this is one of my five favorite edits. Bravo!

Well done and highly recommended!
 
Last edited:
The Virtues (2019)
Stephen Graham plays Joseph, an alcoholic who spends his last penny getting to Ireland to see his sister for the first time in 30-years, after she was adopted and he was not. If you know Ireland's dark history with issues around adoption and Catholicism, you already know where it's going but Director/Writer Shane Meadows portrays the characters with such power and sensitivity that I was on the edge of my seat, with bated breath, waiting to see what happens next. Once again, the power of forgiveness, of others and of yourself is central to Meadows' story. Helen Behan and Niamh Algar are so good, holding their own against the acting talent of Graham. I wasn't 100% satisfied with the abrupt ending though, and a couple of the plot threads seemed to go for shock value resolutions.

 
Amsterdam (2022)
'Amsterdam' continues my fruitless search for a David O. Russell film that I unreservedly love but I enjoyed it more than his other stuff. It's overall problem is that it tries to cram in too many ideas but that makes for a more entertaining and thought provoking watch, than a film that lacks any ambition. It's trying to say things about love, life, and friendship, at the same time as it's building a quasi-historical mystery plot based on several factual political scandals from the inter-war period. The stylistically confused feeling is increased by lengthy irrelevant flashbacks, internal monologues and freeze-frames. Towards the end, a character makes one passing mention of "the Vril", which might pass many viewers by, but I knew to be from the 1871 Sci-Fi novel 'The Coming Race' (which I only know because it inspired the name of the still popular and delicious Victorian British Beef extract 'Bovril'), so I thought "Oh god, is this really going to suddenly go full 'They Live' "lizard-people"?!?" but it doesn't. That kind of sums up the film, in that I couldn't rule out the film doing something that nuts but ultimately it goes nowhere.

Half the casting is wonderfully eccentric and endearing, Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, Mike Myers etc but half is badly miscast, such as Anya Taylor-Joy, Andrea Riseborough and Rami Malek, who do these really creepy performances, then we're supposed to be surprised that the three of them are in fact not nice people. Robert De Niro appears to be half asleep and John David Washington continues to be one of the worst leading men working in movies right now. During his first scene, where he's delivering important exposition with so little life that I actually zoned out and had to rewind the film and listen again, in walks Taylor Swift and I though "thank heavens, an actor of real stature!". Despite all that, I can't say I didn't really enjoy watching this odd little world.



The Banshees of Inisherin (2022)
I felt a lot rested on some fabulously watchable performances from all involved and some deliciously dry and black humour. The story didn't add up satisfactorily for me by the end and the allegory was somehow simultaneously blunt/obvious and too vague. I would have enjoyed spending 2-hours with these eccentric characters and their self-inflicted petty dramas, without the overwrought actual self-inflicted wounds. Still one of the better films of the year though. I was a little distracted by the opening shots being similar to the credits of 90s sitcom 'Father Ted' (also set on a fictional Irish island), well before at least two of the cast appear in the film.


Seems I'm not the only one to notice the FD connection:


 
Elton John Live: Farewell from Dodger Stadium (2022)
I hit play on this as soon as I noticed it on Disney+. I saw Elton and his amazing live band when they played the small Football ground in my home town about 15-years ago. I can still hear the volume and visceral force of the guitar riff from 'The Bitch Is Back' to this day! I remember him giving it his all and playing the piano upside down at one point. But now he's 75 and about to retire, so for this film of his farewell concert at Dodger Stadium, I wasn't expecting the same energy... but boy did he deliver the hits for 2.5-hrs. He looked slower on his feet but his fingers weren't slow on the keyboard. The best bits were actually the instrumental sections where the band really rocked out. The frequent cutaways to the 50K strong crowd having the time of their lives was infectious, there was even a guy proposing to his girlfriend. I believe this was originally live streamed in November but has now been remixed, finessed and graded to an impossibly glossy looking affect. Not just an end to a career but maybe to a whole era, because there can't be many guys left from the days of true global stardom, when we all watched the same few TV channels, and listened to the same few radio stations, who have a catalogue of pop hits this deep, that everybody knows, word for word. Things like this make life better!

It's on YouTube too (but it's higher quality on Disney+ and with optional lyrics):

 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom