Film

Hasret (Yearning): Ben Hopkins

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18/01/15

Ben Hopkins seems genuinely pleased. He’s flown in from his home town of Berlin for a special screening of his ‘expressionist’ documentary Hasret (Yearning) at Home, Manchester and it must be gratifying to see a full screening theatre for the event. Hasret is, after all, not the kind of film that usually packs out cinemas. It’s a vibrant love letter to the city of Istanbul and forms the final part of what Hopkins refers to as his ‘Turkish trilogy.’

What appears at first to be a conventional documentary, quickly metamorphoses into much more than that, as elements appear that confirm it is in fact, a kind of meta-fiction. Interspersed with vivid footage shot on the streets of the city, there are elements that appear to have stepped straight out of an MR James story – the unexplained appearance of a ghostly woman in a landscape, a mysterious man who gives Hopkins phone numbers which enable him to speak to dead people. It’s all so cunningly done that you constantly find yourself asking which parts are real and which parts are fake, something that I take up with Ben as we settle ourselves at a table in Home’s second floor bar.

For instance, the film begins with Ben claiming that he was originally commissioned to make a straightforward travel documentary, but was increasingly tempted to go off-brief.’

‘No,’ says Ben, gleefully. ‘That was all lies!’

OK, so how would he describe Hasret?

‘Well, it’s a documentary about Istanbul, but it’s also a documentary about the process of making a documentary. I’m lucky in that I have a body of work that is well-regarded, which allows me to do films like this. For anyone just starting out, the opportunity to make a film about Istanbul that wasn’t just a straightforward travel documentary… well, it would be very difficult. As it is, I struggled to get funding. There’s an element in our televisual culture that edges towards the superficial. Producers would rather see something about the great food on offer, the oysters, the baked goat.’

Amazingly though, we should be aware from the very start that something is up. All that business about Hopkins and his two man crew arriving at their destination in a container ship, because the company that commissioned the film ‘couldn’t afford plane tickets’…

‘Exactly,’ agrees Ben. ‘It would probably be cheaper to fly than to travel that way. I’m saying, right from the beginning, don’t take this entirely seriously.’

There are scenes in the film, I suggest, thinking particularly of the ones shot amidst the city’s late night club scene, that suggest Ben and his team might occasionally have been in danger of being caught up in violence.

‘I’ve been robbed in Istanbul once and ripped off another time, and sure I’ve witnessed a couple of fights, but I’ve never personally felt physically threatened,’ he assured me. “The fights are usually about somebody disrespecting somebody else’s sister and as I don’t go around disrespecting anyone, I usually get by.’

Much of the film is concerned with the gentrification of Istanbul, how some of the oldest parts of the city being bulldozed to create swish new homes for the wealthy. I ask Ben how he feels about that.

‘Very sad,’ he says. ‘’Of course, all cities change and regenerate. This building we’re sitting in now, for instance, is brand new and replaced something that was here before. Sometimes these things are good. Sometimes they’re inevitable. The difference in Turkey is that often there’s an entirely politically motivated intention for the changes… so for instance an area that’s home to communists and shiites will be bulldozered, simply to disperse the people who live there, to teach them a lesson. I’m afraid that happens a bit too often in Turkey.’

I ask Ben if he has anything else in the pipeline.

‘I actually have another film opening in Britain on Friday, called Lost In Karastan. It’s a film I made before this one and I’ll be doing some publicity for that later in the week.’

And given a substantial budget, what would he do next?

‘A horror film,’ he says, without hesitation. He’s clearly a fan of the genre. I ask him is he has an all-time favourite and I’m delighted to learn that it’s one of my favourites too, Jack Clayton’s superb supernatural chiller, The Innocents, a film that these days carries a 12 certificate despite being absolutely terrifying.

I ask if he has already written the screenplay for his horror movie and he smiles and nods. ‘It’s all ready to go,’ he says. ‘All I need now are the actors and…’ He grins ruefully. ‘The budget.’

Ah yes, there’s always the budget.

‘There is,’ he agrees. ‘And that’s the main reason why, if I won the lottery tomorrow, I’d probably give up film-making.’

‘Really?’ I ask incredulously.

‘Yes. Don’t get me wrong. I love filming, I love writing, I love working with the actors and I love working with the producers. I just hate the process of trying to raise money.’

And with that, he moves on to his next interview and we head out into the night. My feeling is, we should all watch this space. Provided Ben doesn’t win the lottery… and let’s face it, what are the odds? -there should be a really chilling horror film with his name attached heading in our general direction in a year or so. Until then, Hasret is screening in London tonight (19th January) at the Bertha DocHouse, Curzon Bloomsbury, before a wider opening in Turkish cinemas in March, so if you get the chance to go along to the event, please do. It’s a remarkable and enigmatic film that deserves a wider audience.

Philip Caveney

 

 

 

 

A Little Chaos

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17/01/15

We missed its theatrical release but here it is, courtesy of Netflix, made all the more prescient by the recent death of its much-admired director and star, Alan Rickman. This isn’t quite Rickman’s swan song (there are a couple of films still awaiting release) but given the sadness of the situation, I only wish I could say that I liked A Little Chaos more than I actually did. It’s a polite film, handsomely mounted but lacking power and conflict and moreover, it’s a story that plays fast and loose with history.

King Louis XIV (Alan Rickman) is in the process of creating the famous gardens of Versailles and the man appointed to oversee the task is master gardener, Andre Le Not (Matthias Schoenaerts). Realising that it’s too big a job for one person, he decides to apportion certain areas to other contractors and holds interviews for the posts. One applicant is the (completely fictional) Sabine De Barra (Kate Winslet), trying to make headway in a world dominated by men – the fact that she manages to do so, probably emphasises more than anything else that this really is fiction. Something about her captivates Le Not (it’s definitely not her skills with herbaceous borders) and he assigns her the job of creating a water garden for the King. But as she struggles to carry out the work, she meets with considerable opposition, not least from Le Not’s bitchy wife, Madame Le Not (Helen McRory) who does everything she can to scupper Sabine’s plans. All the while, Sabine is harbouring a secret – a sadness from her past that keeps returning to haunt her.

There’s not much else to report. The inherent bitchiness of Louis’s court is nicely sketched  and there’s a fabulous scene where Sabine encounters the king and mistakes him for a gardener, something that Louis enjoys and encourages. It’s here where you really appreciate Rickman’s qualities as an actor, offering a sleepy, lizard like sensuality that makes the sequence a bit of a standout – but sadly there aren’t enough delights of this quality to carry the film. Winslet is terrific, but then she generally is and Schoenaerts, a Belgian playing a Frenchman, makes a decent fist of an English accent, something he’s obliged to do in order to tie in with everyone else.

And a major problem is, that when we finally see Sabine’s water garden, something she’s laboured on throughout the film, its… well, a little underwhelming.

It’s not a trial to watch – it will provide a diverting hour or so of entertainment – but one can’t help feeling that it might have been more than that. Which given recent circumstances makes the whole thing seem a trifle sad.

3.2 stars

Philip Caveney

 

The Revenant

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14/01/16

This time last year, Alejandro Gonzalez Inaritu dazzled the cinema-going public with his quirky comedy, Birdman. Now he dazzles us again, with something entirely different – a bleak, gruelling historical drama, based on a real life story, a film that pulses with bone-jarring violence offset by eerily beautiful location photography.  The Revenant looks set to dominate this year’s Oscars and it’s clearly a hard-won victory. At times, the actors look as though they’re going through as gruelling an experience as their screen counterparts. Here is the life of an 1820s fur trapper in all its grimy glory. It doesn’t look an appealing way to make a living.

The story concerns an expedition into the American wilderness in the depths of winter. Hugh Glass (Leonardo Di Caprio) is the team’s scout and he’s accompanied by his mixed-race son, Hawk (Forest Goodluck). Barely ten minutes into the action, the men are attacked by Arikara warriors and only a handful of them escape with their lives. Matters aren’t helped when, shortly afterwards, Glass is attacked by a grizzly bear (a prolonged scene of almost unwatchable savagery) and is left close to death. The team leader, Captain Andrew Henry (Domhnall Gleason) decides to strike out for their home base and leaves Glass in the care of seasoned trapper John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy) and callow youth Jim Bridger (Will Poulter). Henry instructs Fitzgerald to give Glass a decent burial when ‘his time comes.’ But Fitzgerald is a survivalist. He murders Hawk and leaves Glass for dead, throwing him into a half dug grave and abandoning him to a slow and painful death. But Glass’s hunger for revenge somehow keeps him alive…

This is the second time the story has inspired a film. In 1971, Man In The Wilderness starring Richard Harris, used the basis of it but changed Glass’s name to Zachary Bass. Inaritu’s film actually sticks closer to the real tale and has the added advantage of Emmanuel Lubezski’s stunning cinematography, his fluid camerawork soaring and sweeping throughout the action to create an almost immersive experience. Often you’ll find yourself closer to the action than is strictly comfortable. In one scene, Glass’s breathing actually fogs the camera lens – in another, blood spatters the screen. And then there are sequences featuring Glass’s fever dreams, strange, hypnotic, almost hallucinatory. It all makes for grim but compelling viewing. Many will be repelled by the extreme violence and a scene where Glass takes refuge from the cold inside a freshly killed horse – yes, you read that right – isn’t going to sit well with any vegetarians in the audience. (Strangely, this isn’t as ridiculous as it might seem. It was an old buffalo hunter’s trick to keep warm inside the gutted carcass of a freshly killed bison. Like a fleshy electric blanket).

The Revenant is an extraordinary slice of cinema, an epic story of survival, of man against nature. If Di Caprio ends up lifting the best actor Oscar (despite speaking only a handful of lines in the entire film) I for one won’t begrudge it to him. I’d say he’s earned it, if only in the scene where he’s required to devour a live fish.

Unmissable.

5 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Room

11/01/16

Emma Donoghue’s Room is one of my favourite books of recent times: a terrifying tale of kidnap and abuse, rendered somehow hopeful and life-affirming by its young narrator, Jack. The boy has no idea that the tiny, locked room he lives in is a prison; he thinks it is the world. And the world, as he knows it, is small but full of love. After all, Ma is with him all the time, and she is always good to him.

But it’s a worry – isn’t it ? – when a favourite novel is adapted for the screen. There’s no way a director can ever realise every reader’s vision and, when you’ve constructed clear and absolute impressions of the characters and their environs,  disappointment seems almost inevitable.

Almost. But not quite. Because Emma Donoghue is a bona fide artiste, and she did not merely sell the rights to Room to the highest bidder. Instead, she waited for an offer that allowed her to write the screenplay herself and, oh, am I glad she did. Because Room the movie is just as heartbreaking and affecting as its source material and, although there are of course changes made to suit the form, it seems that very little is compromised. ‘Room’ is just as weirdly claustrophobic, joyous, repellant and homely on film as it is on the page.

Jacob Tremblay, as Jack, is a revelation. He’s expressive and appealing and extremely natural; hats off to director Lenny Abrahamson for eliciting this performance from such a  young actor. And Brie Larson is marvellous too, delivering a subtle but curiously intense and credible portrayal of Joy, a young woman who has, against such overwhelming odds, managed to create a happy childhood for her beloved little boy.

OK, so maybe there are a couple of scenes that could have teased out some more tension (when Old Nick drops Jack, for example), and it would have been nice to have seen William H. Macy’s part developed into something more, but these are minor quibbles in the face of an affecting and engaging film.

4.6 stars

Susan Singfield

Film Bouquets 2015

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08/01/2016

It was a pretty decent year for film. Here, in order of release rather than stature, are our favourite movies of 2015.

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Birdman – Director: Alejandro Gonzalez Inaritu

This effortlessly quirky film was really all about live theatre and the essential differences between the two disciplines. Michael Keaton dazzled in the lead role and was brilliantly supported by a stellar cast. It was all ingeniously edited to look like one continuous tracking shot.

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The Theory of Everything – Director: James Marsh

A superb biopic of Professor Stephen Hawking featuring stunning central performances from Eddie Redmayne, and Felicity Jones as his long-suffering wife. It managed to be genuinely tear-jerking but never strayed into sentimentality. A hard tightrope to walk, but accomplished with ease.

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Whiplash – Director: Damien Chazelle

The adventures of a young jazz percussionist,(newcomer, Miles Teller) and the brutal bandleader (JK Simmons) who drove him to the very edge of sanity. Riveting stuff from start to finish and though Teller’s buttoned-up character was rather unlikable, nevertheless you cared about him.

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It Follows – Director: David Robert Mitchell

This nifty low budget delight reinvigorated the horror movie, throwing in a generous splash of vintage John Carpenter. Look at it as an allegory about STDs or a protestant condemnation of promiscuity, but it manages to wrack up almost unbearable levels of tension. Look behind you!

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Mad Max: Fury Road – Director: George Miller

Miller’s triumphant return to his famous franchise after a thirty-five year absence was a jet-fuelled, turbo-charged jolt of pure adrenalin. For the uninitiated, it must have been like putting your head in a tumble drier and pressing the ‘on’ switch. I went back for a second look, days later!

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London Road – Director: Rufus Norris

Clearly indebted to its theatrical roots, but still a truly cinematic work and probably the most original movie of the year, Rufus Norris’s film about the infamous Ipswich murders of 2006 is a compelling and occasionally staggering ensemble piece that lingers long in the mind.

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Inside Out – Directors: Pete Docter, Ronnie Del Carmen

Pixar rediscovered their mojo with this animated delight, which seemed to draw its inspiration from The Numskulls. With as much to please adults as there was for a younger audience, this didn’t put a foot wrong, while the script would have given Sigmund Freud a run for his money.

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Amy – Director: Asif Kapadia

Compiled from found footage, this stunning documentary did more than confirm what we thought we already knew about Amy Winehouse. It showed she’d been virtually hounded to her death by the tabloid press and gave her story a sense of tragedy that left most audiences in tears.

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45 Years – Director: Andrew Haigh

This stylish film lays bare the complexities behind the relationship of a long married couple as they approach an important anniversary. Tom Courtenay and Charlotte Rampling excel in this slow-burning tale of love and regret set against the bleak backdrop of the Norfolk Broads.

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The Martian – Director: Ridley Scott

After the disappointment of Prometheus, Scott needed to find his way back into outer space and he did it with this winning tale, based on Andy Weir’s novel. More science fact, than fiction, Matt Damon starred as an astronaut stranded on the red planet, but determined to get back to earth.

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Carol – Director: Todd Haynes

This stylish 60s set melodrama confirmed Haynes as one of the finest directors of our time. There were splendid performances by Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara and a stunning evocation of a lost era. Throw in a gorgeous score by Carter Burwell and really, what’s not to like?

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The Lady In The Van – Director: Nicholas Hytner

There has to be a comedy, right? And this wry  adaptation of Alan Bennett’s book pitched everything perfectly, with stand out performances from Dame Maggie Smith and Alex Jennings as the distinguished author – or rather as two different versions of him – an inspired touch.

Philip Caveney

Creed

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07/01/15

if asked to create a list of franchises that didn’t really need another instalment, the Rocky series would surely figure high on a lot of people’s lists. It’s easy to forget, though, that back in 1977, the original film lifted the best movie Oscar, trouncing rivals of the calibre of Taxi Driver and Network. Sadly though, the film’s writer and star, Sylvester Stallone went on to produce a series of increasingly cartoonish sequels (he did the same thing with his other big franchise, Rambo) and its these inferior films that tend to linger in the public’s consciousness.

So how do you find a new angle on the story? Writer/director Ryan Coogler, creator of the much-admired Fruitvale Station,  has given it his best shot and it’s to his credit that the resulting film is as watchable as it is. Creed  focuses very much on an African-American perspective. Where earlier films had a powerful white man overcoming black champions, here the familiar story is pitched in reverse (and is therefore arguably a more realistic premise).

Adonis (Michael B. Jordan) is the illegitimate son of the late former world champion, Apollo Creed. He’s grown up with not so much a chip on his shoulder as a five ton boulder. Raised by Creed’s wife in the lap of luxury, Adonis still has an overpowering urge to punch people for a living and has already been the victor in a string clandestine bouts in Mexico, but he longs to go legit. So he throws in his cushy job in L.A, moves to a tiny flat in Philadelphia and searches out a suitable trainer. Inevitably, his gaze falls upon Rocky Balboa, the only man ever to have beaten his old man in the ring.

These days, Rocky (Stallone) is running a restaurant named after his late wife, Adrian and is suffering from a few health issues. Initially reluctant to return to his former life, he sees something in Adonis and… well, you can pretty much work out the rest. Ultimately, it does come down to another gruelling string of training and fighting sequences and those viewers who are turned off by the sight of grown men brutally pummelling each other to unconsciousness are not going to like this at all. There are a few cleverly placed references to the original movie and interestingly, Adonis’s main opponent here is former heavyweight champion, Tony Bellew, playing a character called’Pretty’ Ricky Conlan. Ironically, he looks considerably less buff than most of the actors in the film, but having said that, I still wouldn’t want to trade punches with him.

Jordan is convincing as the ‘hungry’ kid on the block, Stallone still mumbles so much, you only recognise three words out of every five and the film is ultimately KO’d in the final round by some decidedly mawkish dialogue as Rocky points out that Adonis’s punch up with Conlan is just the same as his own battle with the big C. But the climactic fight is thrillingly staged and while it’s not a patch on the likes of Raging Bull or The Fighter, it’s nonetheless the best Rocky film in a very long time.

Not exactly a knockout, then, but it wins on points. Stallone is already threatening a rematch.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney

 

 

Slow West

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05/01/16

I’ve been trying to see this for quite a while. I missed its brief appearance in cinemas, failed to pick up the DVD and then, by chance, noticed it when I was scrolling around Netflix looking for something to watch. I was initially delighted for the opportunity to catch up, but, inevitably, I suppose, was left feeling a little disappointed, because reviews I’d read on its release had led me to expect something amazing; but John Maclean’s film didn’t thrill me as I’d been promised.

Slow West, as you might expect, is set in America but is actually filmed in New Zealand and though the widescreen vistas are undoubtedly handsome, they didn’t really convince as genuine locations. Jay Cavendish (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is a vulnerable sixteen year old Scottish lad, on a mission to find his former ‘sweetheart’, Rose Ross (Caren Pistorius), who has  fled to America with her papa, after he accidentally killed Jay’s wealthy father in a brawl. Jay is rescued from an encounter with bad guys and befriended by the more experienced Silas Selleck (Michael Fassbender) who offers to chaperone him to his eventual destination – but Jay is unaware that Selleck is actually a bounty hunter, after the reward that’s been offered for the Scottish runaways. As it turns out, Selleck is only one of a whole crew of bounty hunters all intent on claiming the hundred dollars ‘dead or alive.’ But who will get there first?

As I said, it’s all handsomely mounted but there’s no real sense of urgency  in the film and despite the fat that a high body count mounts up throughout  proceedings, (something that Maclean focuses on only in the film’s closing moments) you don’t really feel the impact of those killings. Throw in occasional jokey appearances by some rather unconvincing Native Americans and an ending that ought to be devastating, but somehow isn’t, and I can’t help feeling that this film has been somewhat overpraised. It’s not awful, you understand, just a bit… meh.

3.5 stars

Philip Caveney

 

The Bridge

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05/01/16

Since the success of The Killing, Scandi Noir has become something of a TV growth industry – it seems the viewing public can’t get enough of lurid crimes in snowy landscapes – and out of all the series that followed the adventures of Sarah Lund, perhaps The Bridge is the most assured. It incorporates fiendishly twisty (and it has to be said, highly unlikely) plots with a hist of fascinating characters. Most intriguing of all, of course, is Sofia Helin’s remarkable turn as police inspector Saga Noren. I could probably fill a book with praise for Helin’s creation. Saga is somewhere on the autistic spectrum, (it’s never really pinned down) which means that her responses to social situations can be somewhat inappropriate and often, wildly funny, a device that cleverly undercuts the series’ visceral story lines, which would otherwise make relentlessly grim viewing.

In Season One, the corpse of a woman is found lying on the Oresund Bridge – or rather, two corpses, since the top half belongs to one victim and the bottom half to another. (Yes, I know. It’s a trope of this series that no killing is ever straightforward). As the corpse has been deliberately placed at the halfway point between Denmark and Sweden, Saga is required to collaborate with Danish copper, Martin Rohde (Kim Bodnia), an affable married man with serious commitment problems (when we first meet him, he’s just undergone a painful vasectomy). The pairing of the two characters is a masterstroke, creating some ‘odd couple’ interplay that powers the first ten episodes to a suspenseful and heart breaking conclusion. Unlike their American counterparts, the Scandis never shy away from tragedy and Martin in particular is put through the emotional wringer.

In Season Two, Saga and Martin are reunited when a tanker heading towards the Oresund Bridge is found to be without a crew, apart from five drugged youths, who have no idea how they came to be there. The story cleverly links back to Season One and we’re on for another ten episodes of fascinating crime drama, as Saga and Martin try to unravel the ensuing mystery. Martin is called upon to confront the criminal mastermind who tortured him in Season One, Saga tries to establish a stable relationship with spectacularly awkward results and just to up the stakes, there’s a potential outbreak of a killer plague virus…

Season Three presented its fans with a potential problem. After a disagreement with the show’s creators, Bodnia walked, leaving author Hans Rosenfeldt to do a frantic last-minute rewrite. It’s absolutely to his credit that he not only manages to pull it off, but that the introduction of Saga’s new, pill-popping male partner, Henrik (Thure Lindhardt), gives the series a whole new lease of life. It soon becomes clear that Henrik is not the kind of character we have initially assumed he is and in fact, has his own, complicated and tragic back story. (There’s a moment where the rug is pulled out from under us with an unexpected revelation, that is quite frankly, brilliant). Meanwhile, we learn a lot more about Saga’s troubled family background. This new case kicks off with the murder of the owner of Copenhagen’s first gender-neutral pre school and leads to another incredibly complicated series of murders, which involve the recreation of contemporary paintings, using corpses as the raw material. Once again, it’s all rather ridiculous and yet the brilliance of the characters makes you accept what’s happening, no matter how bizarre the events. Against all the odds, the Bridge delivers a third slice of compelling television.

Will there be a fourth season? I certainly hope so. The Bridge is engaging stuff and there’s no indication that Hans Rosenfeldt is running out of ideas. If anything, he’s upping his game… so my advice is to tune in to Netflix and gorge yourself on one of the best crime dramas of recent years.

5 stars

Philip Caveney

Hector

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04/01/16

Through a wintry landscape of the highways and byways of the United Kingdom, hobbles Hector (Peter Mullan) an ageing ‘gentleman of the road’. For the past fifteen years, he’s led a solitary life, sleeping in doorways and homeless shelters, eating in motorway service areas and down-at-heel cafes. But now he’s suffering from a serious medical condition, Christmas is coming and he’s finally looking to reconnect with the brother and sister he walked away from all those years ago. Perhaps understandably, they’re unwilling to see him…

Jake Gavin’s low budget tale is undeniably bleak and yet, at the same time,  strangely life-affirming, concentrating as it does more on the little kindnesses that strangers give to Hector – the cashier in the motorway services area who stands him a free breakfast, the Sihk corner shop owner who rescues him from the attentions of a couple of muggers, and the adorable Sara (Sarah Solemani) who runs the annual Christmas shelter where Hector is a regular visitor. And here is a film that will actually make you think about those helpless characters in shop doorways that so many of us pass by on a daily basis, often without a second thought. This is by no means a polished production. It’s rough around the edges and has no real conclusion to offer, but it’s a film full of heart, a raw and affecting slice of cinema verité.

Peter Mullan is, of course, a gifted actor and he makes Hector a fully fleshed out character. When he finally reveals the reason why he walked away from his family all those years ago, only the staunchest viewers will manage not to shed a tear. Hector is a delightful film, that barely made it to the multiplexes. If you get a chance to see it, big screen or small screen, take it. It’s a charmer.

4.5 stars

Philip Caveney

The Danish Girl

01/01/15

The Danish Girl tells the true story of 1920s landscape artist Einar Wegener, and his transformation into Lili Elbe, the woman he always knew he was supposed to be. Eddie Redmayne stars as the transgender pioneer, but it is Alicia Vikander, as Gerda (Einar’s wife), who really steals the show.

This is a good movie, with a lot of heart. The central relationship and its emotional complexities are explored unflinchingly, and the characters are nuanced and sometimes difficult. Gerda’s bond with Lili is especially dichotomous, as Lili’s emergence serves both to undermine her marriage and elevate her art (Gerda’s portraits of Lili ensure her success as an artist).

It’s beautifully shot: all gorgeous landscape or cityscape, costumes and décor. There isn’t a drab corner in this film, and maybe that’s the reason why it doesn’t quite reach the heights it could; it’s all a little too pretty, even the ugly stuff.

And there is, or should be, a lot of ugly stuff. Lili was one of the first people to undergo sex reassignment surgery – and the consequences were brutal. There need to be some darker elements to make this really clear.

There’s no denying Eddie Redmayne’s skill in depicting both Einar and Lili, but the performance is a little too mannered for my taste. His portrayal of femininity is somewhat overdone: too arch, too simpering, too coy. Maybe this was true of Lili Elbe herself, but it feels a little old-fashioned for a contemporary audience, as if the telling itself has snagged somehow on the very question of gender constructs it purports to explore.

But these are quibbles. It’s an important story, and a very watchable film.

4 stars

Susan Singfield