Anna

11/07/19

Director Luc Besson has been having a thin time of things lately. His love project, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, was a baffling and expensive flop, so it’s little wonder he’s returned to more familiar ground with Anna, which has been awaiting release for some time. This histrionic spy-thriller has the feel of an 80s bonkbuster about it: patently absurd, but nonetheless rather enjoyable as it galumphs gleefully across the career of the titular hero (Sasha Luss), a young woman forced to become a high level assassin.

When we first meet her, she’s down at heel, addicted to drugs and enduring an abusive relationship with her no-good boyfriend, Piotr (Alexander Petrov), who gets her mixed up in some very bad business. But she is rescued (if that’s the right term) by KGB man, Alex (Luke Evans), who offers her an opportunity to ‘better herself.’ From this point, the film cuts to five years later – and from there to three years earlier; and we continue to switch back and forth in time like an out of control roller coaster. While it’s occasionally hard to keep track of exactly where we are, it means that the story often pulls the rug from under the viewer’s feet, throwing out some real surprises. It’s never dull.

Complications arise when CIA man, Lenny (Cillian Murphy), appears on the scene.  Anna carries on doing her missions, whilst longing for the freedom to walk away from something that has become an absolute chore.

Most of the familiar Luc Besson tropes are here: savage punch-ups with Anna taking on entire armies of black-suited hit men, casual executions in glamorous settings and young women slinking around in high end fashions (Anna’s cover identity has her posing as a model). There’s also a lovely turn from Helen Mirren as Anna’s chainsmoking KGB handler, Olga, having great fun in a show-off role.

Everything builds to a cross and double-cross conclusion and, while this isn’t Besson at his very best, it’ll certainly do until his next effort comes along. Just don’t think about that labyrinthine plot too much. You’ll tie your brain in knots.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

The Townhouse

09/07/19

Lower Bridge Street, Chester

We’re visiting my parents in North Wales, and have planned a day out in Chester. Mum’s on the case, and has sussed out a TravelZoo (nope, me neither) voucher for a lunchtime meal. It’s at The Townhouse on Lower Bridge Street, right in the middle of town, and she and dad have eaten there before. So far, so good.

The Townhouse is a boutique hotel, and the brasserie – where we’re eating – is in an attractive space leading off a velvet-sofa-ed bar. It’s quite formal, all pale linen and plush upholstered seats, but it’s fresh and inviting, with French windows opening on to a plant-filled patio.

The voucher affords us four three-course meals for just £58. (Some options carry a small supplement, as you’d expect.) My starter of goat’s cheese and honey bonbons is a lovely blend of sweet and salt and, although the quinoa, beetroot and balsamic salad that accompanies it is a little gritty in texture, it tastes divine. Philip has the smoked haddock and spring onion fishcake, which is robustly made, with a real depth of flavour.

My main is oven baked breast of chicken, with giant couscous, charred carrots and courgettes, broccoli, crispy kale and red pepper pesto. It’s delicious: the chicken is beautifully cooked, and the couscous concoction is bursting with flavour. The only mis-step – and it is a serious mis-step – is the crispy kale, which dissolves into an unpleasant pool of oil as soon as I crunch down on it. Urgh. I push what’s left to the side and enjoy the rest of the dish.

Philip has the carved Welsh lamb rump, which carries a £4 supplement. It’s served with a mixed bean cassoulet, fondant potatoes, minted garden peas and a sticky rosemary jus. The meat is succulent, and he’s especially impressed with the savoury taste of the cassoulet.

To finish, Philip has the sticky toffee pudding, which comes with butterscotch sauce and Cheshire Farm vanilla ice cream. It’s a decent example of the classic pud, but maybe not as moist and decadent as it might be. My trio of flavoured crème brûlée is fantastic though, with strawberry and chocolate alongside the classic vanilla. It’s gloriously, lip-smackingly good, and ought to appear on more menus.

We have a glass of wine each (a serviceable sauvignon blanc), and coffee to finish; all in, the extras come to £26. An affordable treat in a central location – you can bet we’ll be back before too long.

4.1 stars

Susan Singfield

Midsommar
Florence Pugh; Jack Reynor DSCF2781.JPG

05/07/19

Rising star Ari Aster’s second movie, Midsommar, is a bucolic horror, a direct descendant of The Wicker Man. Starring Florence Pugh as the troubled Dani, it upends as many horror tropes as it embraces, the excesses building gleefully to a riotous, high-pitched finale.

The film opens with Dani worrying about her sister and pestering her reluctant boyfriend, Christian (Jack Reynor), for reassurance. He’s out with his flatmates: Josh (William Jackson Harper), Mark (Will Poulter) and Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren), frustrated at being disturbed. He wants out of the relationship, he tells his friends, but he’s dithering, loathe to make a decision and act on it.

But then Dani’s parents die suddenly and he can’t ditch her; how can he? She’s clingy and needy, can’t be left alone. Christian feels trapped, compelled to invite her along on the trip he and his pals have planned, to visit the remote commune in Sweden where Pelle grew up, and take part in their midsummer festivities.

The tension here is nicely drawn: Christian caught in the middle between his girlfriend and his friends. Mark does not want Dani there and she is too fragile to let his animosity wash over her. The setup is promising.

From the dingy, gloomy hues of the opening reel, we are suddenly transported to the gloriously colourful and sunlit idyll of Pelle’s home with the Härga people. This is a daytime horror, no murky shadows where monsters lurk: these fiends are hiding in plain sight. Because, of course, not all is as it seems…

This is not a perfect film. There are some clear issues. Christian in particular is underwritten; his behaviour is inconsistent and lacking credible motivation. What we do know (he’s too weak to walk away from a failing relationship; he will deny a friendship, Judas-like) makes him unsympathetic, so it’s hard to care what happens to him. And then there’s Will Poulter. Mark starts off well enough, adding an interesting dynamic to the friendship group. But, once they arrive in Sweden, he seems to slowly fade from the film, a woeful underuse of such a fine actor. Perhaps, though, it’s the unthinking adherence to problematic clichés that causes me the most concern: exoticising the only disabled character; positioning naked elderly women as grotesques; suggesting mental illness is synonymous with violence and murderous intent.

Despite these problems, Midsommar is largely successful, not least for its bravura. Pugh is as compelling as ever, a real physical presence, dominating the screen. And there are some assured flourishes – a sequence where the protagonists’ car seems to quite literally start running upside-down along an inverted highway clearly shows Aster’s directorial chops. The mounting sense of dread is expertly manipulated, with even the silliest scenes adding a genuine disquiet. The fact that it all takes place in this sun-dappled pastoral hideaway only serves to highlight the brutality.

It’s worth noting too that all the horror here is human: we don’t need the supernatural; we are quite evil enough.

4.1 stars

Susan Singfield

 

Robert the Bruce

02/07/19

The story of Robert the Bruce recently had a creditable outing on Netflix in Outlaw King, with Chris Pine taking on the titular role, and now – after first portraying the rebel leader in Braveheart (1995) – Angus MacFadyen finally brings us his sequel to that box office smash. But while the two earlier films were epic in scale, Robert the Bruce, co-written by MacFadyen and directed by Richard Grey, tells a story on a much more intimate scale.

After fighting (and repeatedly losing) for many years, and with a harsh winter descending on his ragged army, Robert is disillusioned enough to dismess his men and head off into the wilds to consider his options. The fact that there is a sizable reward on his head motivates several of his former comrades to go after him, bent on claiming the money. Seriously wounded in a skirmish, Robert staggers into a remote cave, where he spots the infamous spider at work – and from there, he wanders close to the home of Morag (Anna Hutchison) and her extended family.

Despite the obvious dangers of helping an outlaw, Morag takes him in and heals his wounds. She is a widow, whose husband died fighting for the Scottish cause. His brother, Brandubh (Zack McGowen), however, is the local sheriff. He has his eyes both on Morag and the reward money…

Set during a convincingly frozen winter, the film flirts with the concept of legend, unfolding some of the events as a story told by Morag to her young son, Scot (Gabriel Bateman). The narrative doesn’t always hang convincingly together: Brandubh manages to look like the most gullible man who ever lived, and it would have been useful to see some of the depravations of the ruling English, just to remind us why the Scottish chose to fight their oppressors so defiantly. But there are definite compensations here, in a series of appealing performances and the sometimes ravishing location photography, much of it shot in Montana, but with key sequences familiar from our recent trip to the Isle of Skye.

And while the lack of pitched battles may have been forced by a tight budget, it’s actually refreshing to watch, for once, a historial movie that doesn’t descend into one endless brawl.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Apollo 11

29/06/19

Like many people old enough to remember the Apollo 11 moon landing in June 1969, the thing that resonates with me most is the palpable air of excitement that gripped the general public as three American astronauts prepared to attempt the unthinkable. Their mission? To fly to the moon, walk around on it for a while and then travel safely back to their families on earth. Could such a thing possibly be done? And what were their chances of survival?

This documentary, compiled entirely from news footage of the period and including some never-before-seen material, sets out to to chronicle that story.  Compiled by Todd Douglas Miller, with a pulsing electronic soundtrack by Eric Milano, this is an absorbing and eye-opening account of a famous event that actually manages to achieve the impossible, creating a real sense of suspense – remarkable when you consider that we all know the story’s outcome.

Looking at the footage now, what comes across is the sheer clunkiness of the operation. As Neil Armstrong attempts to pilot a landing module that appears to be held together with lengths of gaffa tape and blobs of chewing gum, the sheer recklessness of the enterprise is absolutely staggering. Also, I am astonished at the immensity of the operation, the stock footage revealing scores and scores of white-shirted, chain-smoking crewcut men (and they are, nearly all of them, men) sitting at primitive screens, each operator charged with one tiny detail of the overall mission.

And finally there’s the sense of an entire nation, holding its concerted breath and gathering in droves to watch a giant rocket ship blast off into the unknown. Amazing to think that it was all achieved with equipment that marshalled considerably less computing power than the phone in my pocket.

This won’t be for everyone. Some will long for in-depth interviews with the protagonists, a more human angle to the story – and I have to confess that for some of the dialogue coming in from outer space via primitive speaker systems, subtitles would undoubtedly be a useful addition.

But as an account of one of mankind’s most mind-boggling achievements, Apollo 11 is well worth your attention. And to those who still insist that the whole enterprise was a complex sham, secretly filmed by Stanley Kubrick – if this doesn’t make you change your mind, then frankly, nothing ever will.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Amélie: the Musical

25/06/19

My first thought on hearing that Jean Pierre-Jeunet’s 2001 movie had been turned into a stage musical was ‘how the hell are they going to pull that off?’ The answer? With charm and élan. Unlike so many recent ‘film-to-stage’ adaptations, which are merely attempts to slavishly copy the look and feel of the original, Amélie: the Musical is an accomplished theatrical experience in its own right.

It is, off course, the story of Amélie Poulain (Audrey Brisson), a shy loner who lives her life vicariously through the experiences of others. As a child (where she is adorably portrayed by a puppet), her eccentric parents convince themselves that their little girl is suffering from a rare heart condition and subsequently deny her all contact with the outside world. Little wonder she turns out as she does.

After her mother’s bizarre death and her father’s increasing isolation, Amelie realises she needs to seek new horizons. She packs a bag and heads off to Paris, where she takes a job as a waitress in a little café and becomes increasingly involved in the lives of her colleagues, customers and neighbours. She also bumps into Nino (Danny Mac) on the Metro, a young man who has a strange preoccupation with public photo-booths. She immediately feels a powerful attraction to him – but how will she ever overcome her shyness and summon up the courage to speak to him?

There’s an ensemble cast of sixteen actors, all of whom play musical instruments and most of whom are onstage throughout, providing a haunting accompaniment to the action. The songs by Nathan Tyson and Daniel Messé are memorable – I particularly enjoy the sequence where Amélie fantasises that she is the recently deceased Princess Diana, and Elton John (Caolin McCarthy) delivers a heartfelt elegy to mark her passing. Special mention should also be made of Madeleine Girling’s ingenious set design, which, with a few minor adjustments, manages to transform itself into a whole series of locations, as the cast troop back and forth with military precision. As Amélie, Brisson is an extraordinary presence, whether she’s slinking around in pursuit of some new objective or zooming effortlessly up to her circular lair above the action.

Amelie: the Musical comes closer than most film adaptations to achieving the best of both worlds. Fans of the movie will feel that it has been shown exactly the right amount of respect, while lovers of theatre will enjoy this as a gloriously eccentric theatrical event.

Win-win!

4.4 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Toy Story 4

23/06/19

It’s hard to believe that the original Toy Story first graced cinema screens in 1995, back when my own daughter was a little girl. The film was a game-changer in so many ways, pioneering CG animation and launching the start of Pixar’s amazing run of superb features. Along the years, there were – inevitably – a couple of sequels. Toy Story 2 debuted in 1999, introducing a new character, Jessie (Joan Cusack), and the third instalment, which ambled onto screens in 2010, seemed to provide the perfect end to a consistently excellent trilogy.

Like most people, I wasn’t really overjoyed to learn that Pixar were returning to the well one more time. I mean, ask yourself, is there a fourth part of any film franchise that works? All things considered, then, it’s a credit to Pixar’s undoubted production skills that this is as enjoyable as it is.

Since the toys’ original owner, Andy, headed off to college and donated his collection to Bonnie, Woody (Tom Hanks) has come to terms with the fact that he is no longer top dog in the toy closet, often finding himself left in there with the older members of the team, while Bonnie plays with newer acquisitions. But, he’s well aware that toys must move on. After all, Bo Peep (Annie Potts) suffered that fate in the second film, sent to an unknown destination, and Woody often wonders what became of her. However, he still has the love of a child and that’s the most important thing in the world for any toy, right?

I’ll confess that these early stretches, though as skilfully rendered as ever, do not exactly inspire me. It feels as though we’re retracing old ground. However, when Bonnie is sent to her first day at kindergarten, things pick up a little. She fashions a toy of her own out of a plastic spork and  a length of pipe cleaner, naming her creation Forky and falling unconditionally in love with him. Forky (Tony Hale) struggles to accept his new role as a toy. He thinks of himself as trash and spends most of his time trying to throw himself into the nearest litter bin, but – for Bonnie’s sake – Woody takes on the role of Forky’s minder.

Then Bonnie’s parents decide to take her on a road trip and the whole gang get to go along. The family’s RV does a stop over at an amusement park and it’s here that Woody reconnects with Bo, who has been surviving out on her own for years and has become a plucky, independent adventurer with loftier ambitions than simply being a child’s plaything. From here, the film becomes much more interesting, unveiling a sinister side to proceedings with the appearance of Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks), a vintage doll with a broken voice box, trapped in a second hand store. She has her own entourage of minders (four incredibly creepy ventriloquist dolls) and, spotting that Woody has the kind of voice box she needs, sees an opportunity to ingratiate herself with the shop owner’s granddaughter, Harmony.

The film has one more trump card to play in the shape of Duke Caboom (Keanu Reeves) a Canadian stunt motorcyclist (clearly modelled on Evil Knievel), who has been haunted all his life by his inability to match up to the promises made in his advertising campaign. This feels like a role that Reeves was born to play and he does it with glee.

So yes, this is enjoyable enough, even if it doesn’t quite measure up to those illustrious predecessors. There are some problems with the story’s internal logic. I find myself  wondering why, despite their advanced years, the toys still manage to look pristine. Shouldn’t they be a bit scuffed and (whisper it!) damaged by now? Wouldn’t that have made for an interesting strand? And, since Woody is now considered a second level toy, how come he even gets to go on that fateful road trip in the first place?

Perhaps I’m just being picky. The scores of well-behaved youngsters at the afternoon screening I attend are proof that Toy Story 4 does exert considerable charms on its intended audience – and at the end of the day, I have to admit that I enjoy it along with them.

But please, Pixar, don’t be tempted to do a part 5! There’s only one direction to go from here and it’s the place where Forky longs to be!

4 stars

Philip Caveney

Rolling Thunder Revue: a Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese
Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue featured an ad-hoc accidental masterpiece of a band, which played rousing, irreverent versions of songs from his catalog

22/06/19

True confession: I’ve never been one of Bob Dylan’s greatest fans.

There, I said it. Oh sure, I had a brief infatuation with Highway 61 Revisited back in the day, and I’d be the first to suggest that The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll is a strong contender for ‘greatest protest song ever written.’ But something in Dylan’s mannered drawling voice made me decide that I preferred his songs sung by other artists. Now along comes this unwieldily titled concert movie, and I find myself having to re-evaluate my position. Rolling Thunder portrays an artist at the very peak of his powers, casually throwing out solid-gold belters as though by some kind of involuntary reflex.

Of course, there’s nothing new about a lot of this footage. It’s been mostly salvaged from Dylan’s own attempt to film his 1975/6 tour under the title Renaldo and Clara, which died a quiet death at the box office more than forty years ago. And this isn’t exactly a straight concert film either, featuring – as it does – some fictional elements. There’s Martin Von Haselerg as ‘The Filmmaker,’ claiming to be the film’s true author. There’s Sharon Stone, telling us that she was taken on as a wardrobe assistant on the tour at the age of eighteen (she wasn’t). And there’s Michael Murphy as ‘The Politician,’ making comments about the bicentenary that was taking place as Dylan and his motley crew strutted their stuff around a series of intimate venues across America.

But there’s plenty here to enjoy, not least a pugnacious rendition of Hattie Carroll with Dylan contemptuously spitting out the lyrics at the crowd; the scene where Joan Baez and Dylan reveal that the two of them really should have married each other, instead of other people; and, of special interest to me, the sequence where a radiant Joni Mitchell knocks out an early draft of Coyote, while Dylan and Roger McGuinn meekly accompany her on guitars. (This song, of course, is about her brief affair with playwright Sam Shepard, who also appears in the film.)

With its hefty running time, this might not have found an audience at the cinema, so Netflix seems the ideal home for it. Dylan aficionados will have a field day – and those who, like me, have been sitting on the fence concerning Mr Zimmerman, may have something of an epiphany.

4.4 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Yesterday

20/06/19

Welcome to Richard Curtis Land – a magical place where famous film stars can fall in love with meek bookshop owners; where smitten young men can write their declarations of love for recently married women on a series of cue cards; and where, in this latest iteration, the Beatles never existed. Yes, that’s right. Imagine if you will, a world where the names John, Paul, George and Ringo mean absolutely zilch.

Aspiring singer/songwriter Jack Malik (Himesh Patel) is scratching a precarious existence playing a series of dead-end bookings by night, and working at a cash and carry by day. His gigs are arranged for him by his ‘manager,’ Ellie Appleton (Lily James), who works days as a secondary school teacher and who quite clearly fancies the pants off Jack, something he appears to be entirely oblivious to. But, after his last disappointing show, Jack is about ready to give up his dreams and ‘go back to teaching…’

He is blissfully unaware that his career is about to take an unexpected leap in an upward direction. Riding home on his bike one evening, he is struck by a bus, at the same moment a sudden loss of electricity hits the entire world for a full twelve seconds. Once recovered from his accident, Jack discovers that there have been some baffling changes to the world he knows – and when he sings Paul McCartney’s Yesterday to a bunch of friends, they react very strangely. ‘When did you write that?’ asks Ellie, incredulously.

A bit of surfing on the internet reveals the incredible truth. In this new alternate reality, the Beatles have never existed – and yet Jack knows most of their songs! So he starts to perform and record them, passing them off as his own work and – perhaps not surprisingly – after a few false starts, his career shoots upwards into the stratosphere. But we know, don’t we, that there’s always a price to pay for such deceit? And what true happiness can ever be achieved through an act of plagiarism?

Yesterday is a typical Curtis vehicle, amiable, and eminently watchable – but the film is directed by Danny Boyle, who displays none of the distinctive, visual flourishes I’ve come to expect from him, leaving me with the conviction that this could have been directed by just about anybody. While the earlier stretches are surely the funniest (there’s some nice interplay between Jack and his parents, played by Meera Syal and Sanjeev Bhaskar), later developments, where Jack falls under the influence of heartless record executive, Debra Hammer (Kate McKinnon), are not quite as assured.

And… there’s something that this film has in common with Curtis’s earlier effort, About Time: the story’s internal logic doesn’t always add up. Occasionally, I find myself thinking ‘Really?’ as some new revelation comes lurching out of the woodwork. Am I supposed to believe, for instance, that Jack manages to walk around for months without ever noticing that cigarettes no longer exist?

Still, this isn’t meant to be high art. Curtis is a talented storyteller, and for the most part this affable mix of comedy and music is perfectly entertaining. And, naturally, it has a soundtrack to die for. A shame then that it doesn’t give Danny Boyle more of a chance to show off his skills.

That would have been something to make a song and dance about.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney

 

Captain Corelli’s Mandolin

18/06/19

King’s Theatre, Edinburgh

Louis de Bernière’s novel was a huge hit when it was first published back in 1995, but – despite being something of a bookworm – I didn’t read it. The blurb just didn’t appeal; I’ve never been one for sentimentality. I didn’t see the film either, which – by all accounts – was even more schmaltzy. But, twenty-five years on, I’m feeling a bit more mellow and forgiving, and looking forward to finding out what the fuss was all about.

And I love this theatrical production, adapted by Rona Munro and directed by Melly Still. That is to say, I love the way it’s done: the kooky choreography and Mayou Trikerioti’s ingenious design. I’m not keen on the story – a predictably mawkish affair, covering every war-romance cliché out there – but the telling is rather wonderful.

We’re in Cephalonia, represented here by a huge rumpled metal backdrop, hanging skew-iff above the Iannis’s dainty herb garden, its sharp edges poised to destroy what they have grown. It dominates the stage, with light and video projections capturing the impact of war and natural disasters on the islanders’ lives.

Madison Clare is Pelagia Iannis, a young Greek woman whose first beau, Mandras (Ashley Gayle) leaves the island to join the war. When Cephalonia is occupied by the Italian army, Captain Antonio Corelli (Alex Mugnaioni) moves in to her home, and – despite their initial hostility – the pair soon fall in love.

There’s more to it, of course – this is a saga that spans fifty years – but theirs is the central story, the focus of the tale. Which is a shame, in a way, because some of the subplots seem more interesting: the gay soldiers, for example, or young Lemoni (Kezrena James)’s money-making schemes. Still, both Clare and Mugnaioni give compelling performances, and their affair is tender and believable.

What makes this, though, is the sheer theatricality, the way it revels in its form. The transparent white sheets, for example, that capture the horrific images of soldiers frozen in ice; the lazer-beam-like strings conducting the actors through the caves; the brutality of the firing squad in all its strobe-lit choreographed glory.

I like the animals too: Luisa Guerreiro’s goat, with its plaintive bleating and simple crutch-aided walk; Elizabeth Mary Williams’ lithe and playful pine martin, Psipsina, with its trusting nature and comic responsiveness. These add a light touch to a sad tale, providing warmth and humour, and representing innocence.

The lighting (by Malcolm Rippeth) is inspired: all coppers and golds, evoking the gorgeousness of the Ionian sea and the might of a volcano, the reflections from the metal backdrop rippling across the auditorium.

This is an accomplished production, that soars above its source material.

4.1 stars

Susan Singfield