Lisa Frankenstein

07/03/23

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Diablo Cody first came to my attention with Juno (2007), a whip-smart, whimsical piece of work that deservedly won her the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Two years later, her script for Jennifer’s Body, though divisive, was still an impressive piece of work. Since then, her career has been somewhat hit and miss, but her name is still the main reason I choose to see Lisa Frankenstein. 

So I’m somewhat nonplussed to discover that the film is a dud. Seriously, the word ‘disappointing’ does not cover how bad this is – a slice of horror comedy that isn’t particularly gruesome (given the PG13 certificate) and manages to be about as funny as a car crash. The kindest thing I can think to say about it is that it has stylish opening titles that promise something much more sophisticated than what follows.

Lisa Swallows (Kathryn Newton) has never quite got over the night when her mother was murdered by a random axe murderer. (Laughing yet?) She now lives with her Dad, Dale (Joe Chrest), who is now married to Janet (Carla Gugino, chewing the scenery as the traditional evil stepmother, yet arguably the most watchable element in the film).  Lisa has also acquired a step-sister, Taffy (Liza Soberano), who – against all the odds – is friendly and supportive, which may be the only touch of originality here.

Lisa has taken to spending her spare time in the local cemetery, where she has been brooding beside the grave of a young Victorian male, who died back in 1837. Cue a thunderstorm, a convenient flash of lighting and said creature (played by Cole Sprouse) reanimates and lumbers his way to Lisa’s house, where she – quite by chance – is all alone in her bedroom. The creature is missing a hand and it’s not long before he and Lisa are on the lookout for a replacement…

I honestly want to like this, but almost everything about it misfires. The ‘jokes’ fall flat from the word go; the direction (by Zelda Williams) is perfunctory at best and occasionally rather confusing. While the 1989 setting is decently evoked, the dialogue that emerges from the mouths of the mostly young cast sounds like nothing anyone of that age would ever say. Newton does her best with what she’s been given, but deserves better lines to deliver. It doesn’t help that for nearly all of the film, her co-star Sprouse is only able to make various grunts, growls and shouts. 

The film lurches clumsily onwards, powered only by its own internal logic, but when that logic is so fatally flawed, it takes every ounce of my will to stay in my seat until the end. Sorry to all involved, but this feels like a waste of a sizeable budget that could have been spent on something better than this muddled mess.

1.5 stars

Philip Caveney 

Spaceman

06/03/24

Netflix

Adam Sandler. There, I said it.

Sandler is, of course, best known for his comedies, though these can most politely be described as ‘variable’. More often than not, they seem like an elaborate excuse for Sandler to team up with a bunch of mates and improvise something that feels like it has been literally thrown together. And then, every now and again, out of the blue, he decides to star in something more substantial for a quality director. I’m thinking of the likes of Punch Drunk Love, which he made with Paul Thomas Anderson, and the stone cold masterpiece Uncut Gems, written and directed by the Safdie Brothers, which possibly qualifies as the most stressful couple of hours I’ve spent in the cinema.

Spaceman, directed by Johan Renck and adapted by Colby Day (from a novel by Jaroslav Kalfar), is not in the same league as those two films and yet it’s a sizeable step up from Sandler’s usual offerings, a slow-moving, thoughtful allegory about the distance that can exist between a man and his wife, even when they are physically together.

The Spaceman of the title is Jakub, a Czech cosmonaut, currently on a six-month mission to visit (and take samples from) the mysterious Cloud of Chopra, somewhere beyond Neptune. At home, his pregnant wife, Lenka (Carey Mulligan), is falling out of love with him, because he’s been distant in so many ways -even before he set off on his current voyage.

Jakub is nonplussed to discover that his regular calls to Lenka are going unanswered. He’s even more bewildered to learn that he has a stowaway aboard his spaceship – a huge alien spider, who can talk and is memorably voiced by Paul Dano. (Arachnophobes, take note: this film may not be for you!)

Most movies of this kind would pitch the alien as a voracious predator, with no higher motive than to chow down on the spaceship’s other occupant, but this creature (whom Jakub names Hanûs) turns out to be a gentle and communicative beast, who soon takes on the role of a kind of life coach, offering Jakub advice about all manner of things, including his failing marriage. It’s the sheer unexpectedness of this approach that grabs me most. As the mission steadily unfolds, we begin to learn more about the event that caused the rift between Jakub and Lenka. Can it ever be repaired?

Spaceman won’t be for everyone. For one thing, it moves at a glacial pace, Jakub’s journey interspersed with flashbacks to his courtship of Lenka and occasional cutaways to her present day conversations with her mother, Zdena (Lena Olin). There’s a lot of footage of the mysterious Cloud of Chopra, which – though pleasant enough to look at – soon starts to feel suspiciously like filler.

I will also confess to being initially confused by the ending, but with a little thought it soon makes perfect sense. Overall, Spaceman is an interesting little film with a fascinating premise. Though flawed, it’s light years ahead of Sandler’s customary output.

3.6 stars

Philip Caveney

Bread and Breakfast

05/03/24

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

The latest production in the A Play, A Pie and A Pint season offers a distinct change of pace. Who’s up for a good old-fashioned British farce? You know, the kind of vehicle that Brian Rix would have had a field day with back in the 1960s – slapstick characters painted with broad strokes and even broader dialogue.

Welcome to Nessie’s Lodge, a bed and breakfast somewhere in the Highlands, a place where holidaymakers can relax in real style – provided they turn a blind eye to the indigestible food and the bedbugs… not to mention the rats. I said not to mention them! Proprietor Irene (Maureen Carr) is growing rather tired of the business, even though it boasts a single star from the AA. She dreams of selling the establishment to anybody who’s dumb enough to shell out money for it. But she’s continually hampered by her dimwitted young employee, Jo (Erin Elkin), who somehow manages to misinterpret every instruction she’s given. 

Then, in a distinctly Fawlty Towers twist, an AA restaurant inspector (James Peake) arrives out of the blue and the writing’s on the wall for Nessie’s Lodge. Also on the wall is a possibly priceless work of art that might just save Irene’s bacon…

Bread and Breakfast, written by Kirsty Halliday and directed by Laila Noble, has some genuinely funny lines in the mix, though there’s a worrying tendency to over-signal and over-explain them. Furthermore, it should also be said that those classic Whitehall farces were always anchored by absolute precision and excellent production values – which we can’t really expect from a modestly-budgeted lunchtime show.

The packed crowd at this afternoon’s show are clearly enjoying themselves, laughing throughout. As ever, stalwart actor Carr generates her own brand of potty-mouthed good humour; she’s a natural comic and has the audience in the palm of her hand. Elkin is excellent as Jo, giving her an edgy, almost manic appeal, as she flails from one hapless misunderstanding to another. Meanwhile Peake has the funniest moment of the show, as he delivers a spirited rendition of God Save Our Gracious Quing!  

If Bread and Breakfast isn’t quite to my taste, it’s nevertheless interesting to see a play so tonally different from anything I’ve previously seen at PPP.

3 stars

Philip Caveney

Dune: Part Two

03/03/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

It only needs a glance around the IMAX auditorium at Edinburgh’s Cineworld on this Sunday afternoon to confirm that Denis Villeneuve’s big gamble has paid off. There’s barely an empty seat in the building. 

Dune: Part One came along at a propitious time. It was October 2021 and we were barely out of lockdown, sitting uncertainly in our seats, wearing paper masks and slapping gel on our hands at five-minute intervals. What we needed now was something epic to take our minds off the pandemic and we certainly got that – but what we were also handed was an unfinished story and a three-year wait for its conclusion. 

Would it be worth it?

The answer to that is a resounding yes! If the first film occasionally felt a little too languid for comfort, Part Two ramps the action up to eleven, and Villeneuve has the good sense to keep everything rattling along at full speed ahead. The result is a film that, despite  a running time of just under three hours, never feels overlong. 

And in this case the word ‘epic’ barely does the material justice: this is an immense, eye-popping spectacle, an insanely inspired slice of cinematic world-building that at times leaves me almost breathless at what I’m witnessing up on the giant screen. This, my friends, is why they invented IMAX. If you haven’t seen Part One since its release (or at all for that matter), I’d advise you to catch up with it via streaming before sitting down to the second installment. I did and it helps no end to reacquaint myself with the characters.

We pick up exactly where we left off. Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) and his mother, Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), have survived the murder of most of their family and have sought refuge with the Fremen people in the remotest part of the desert planet, Arrakis. Paul has finally met his (quite literal) dream girl, Chani (Zendaya), and, under the protection of Stilgar (Javier Bardem), he’s learning the ways of the Fremen. 

At the same time, he’s all too aware that some of the more devout members of the tribe are giving him meaningful looks and referring back to an ancient prophecy that a messiah will one day arrive and lead the Fremen to triumph over their oppressors.

Could this be a potential way for Paul to take revenge for the killing of his father by the evil Baron Harkonen (Stellan Skarsgard), who is still skulking in a bathtub doing unspeakably horrible things to everyone who comes near him? And if you think he’s bad, wait till you meet his nephew, the psychopathic Feyd-Rautha (Austin ‘Elvis’ Butler), who redefines the word ‘villain’ in one of the most remarkable screen transformations ever.

Villeneuve has excelled himself here and Dune: Part Two is an extraordinary achievement, one that cements his reputation as one of the great visionaries of the cinema, up there with the likes of David Lean and Stanley Kubrick. His interpretation of Frank Herbert’s source novel spins allegories about the links between religion and drugs, the evils of colonialism, the ruthlessness of royalty, the inevitability of war between the poor and the privileged. That’s all there lurking behind the dazzling action set pieces and massive explosions.

My only niggle (as with the first film) is that the 12A rating sometimes works against the film, when all that violent mayhem must remain essentially bloodless in order to tick the boxes – but it’s not a big enough quibble to dampen my enthusiasm for this giant-sized helping of space fantasy, that quite frankly makes the Star Wars franchise look positively amateurish by comparison. 

And if the story’s conclusion doesn’t feel quite as er… conclusive as I might have expected, the possibility of Dune Messiah looming on a distant horizon may account for it. A trilogy, perhaps? 

Well, it would be rude not to, right?

5 stars

Philip Caveney

Peak Stuff

01/03/24

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

ThickSkin Theatre have a reputation for ambitious, cutting-edge theatre and I’m happy to say that Peak Stuff – a riveting new play by Billie Collins – does not disappoint. Indeed, this edgy slice of words and music manages to keep me on the edge of my seat throughout. 

I’m immediately pulled in by the ingenious set design, which has drummer Matthew Churcher poised in the midst of a hollow, which is itself surrounded by a series of flat panels onto which Jim Dawson and Izzy Pye’s video designs are projected. Churcher is, in effect, the beating heart of the story, his intricate, propulsive rhythms combining with the soaring, majestic music of Neil Bettles (who also directs) and interacting with the narratives of three disparate characters, all memorably played by Meg Lewis.

Alice is a disaffected teenager, who is both appalled and galvanised by the awful reality of life in the 21st century. The world is burning and nobody seems to care! She’s determined to make her voice of protest heard above the hubbub, but is unsure of exactly how to go about making it happen. Ben works in marketing and is a loner, currently living in his mother’s house, which he is steadily filling to bursting point with a whole series of pointless purchases. They include a massive collection of branded trainers, which he never even takes out of their boxes. Online influencer Charlie is gleefully devoting herself to her latest project: selling parts of her body online to the highest bidder, starting with the little finger of her left hand…

How the lives of this strange, unconnected trio unfold is the bedrock upon which Peak Stuff is built – and the greatest wonder of this multifaceted piece is that there are so many ways it could go wrong; the whole edifice could easily collapse in upon itself in a stream of disconnected words, music and lights. The fact that it never does is surely testament to how tightly drilled this creative unit is. Lewis moves effortlessly from character to character, with just the slightest of changes to her voice and posture; Churcher keeps supplying those metronomic rhythms as the excitement steadily builds – and the three narratives combine with the eye-popping video projections which take us from Albert Square, Manchester to the heart of a blazing building.

This is bold, experimental theatre at its finest and the tumultuous applause that greets the final chord is evidence that tonight’s audience has been just as thrilled as I am.

4.6 stars

Philip Caveney

Jack

27/02/24

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

It’s a wet and miserable February day, but we don’t care because A Play, A Pie and A Pint is back – and if I say the new season starts with a whimper, that’s no bad thing. Because the whimper belongs to Jack.

And Jack is a puppy.

At first, our protagonist (Lawrence Boothman) isn’t too enamoured with his Christmas present. He doesn’t like dogs. They smell and they piss everywhere and they require a lot of care. But he can’t say that to ‘Him’, his un-named partner, can he? That’d be ungrateful. “Aw,” he says instead. “You shouldn’t have. Thank you.”

Of course, it doesn’t take Jack long to win the protagonist over, vet bills and chewed-up espadrilles notwithstanding. And when ‘He’ is killed in a car accident, Jack is both a source of comfort and a reason to go on.

Appealingly directed by Gareth Nicholls, Jack is a witty, engaging monologue, effortlessly straddling the line between acerbic humour and devastating emotion. Boothman reels us in from the opening lines and we’re absolutely with the protagonist as he mourns his lover and struggles to cope with his grief.

Liam Moffat’s nicely-crafted script paints a convincing portrait of a man adrift. The protagonist doesn’t know how to be a widower; he’s too young; there’s no template for him to follow. Heartbroken, he rebuffs his London friends but, away from the security of his crowd, he’s startled by the homophobia that denies the importance of his relationship and excludes him from his partner’s funeral.

The set, designed by Kenny Miller, is suitably simple: a raised platform with a sparkly backdrop, a single plastic chair and a ticker tape bearing captions for each successive ‘chapter’ of the protagonist’s story. Dogs really aren’t just for Christmas, it turns out.

So Jack gets this PPP off to a flying start. No, I’m not crying. You are.

4.4 stars

Susan Singfield

Perfect Days

25/02/24

Cameo Cinema, Edinburgh

‘It’s about this guy who cleans toilets for a living.’

Yes, I know. On paper, Perfect Days doesn’t sound like the most promising scenario I’ve ever heard but, in the hands of veteran director, Wim Wenders, it’s so much more than I might have expected. Wenders is somebody who I used to love back in the day. Paris Texas (1984), is the movie I remember him best for, but, since Wings of Desire in 1987, I have lost track of his output. This latest offering is a charming, affectionate study of a man’s everyday working life and the various people he encounters along the way. 

Perfect Days picked up a couple of prestigious prizes at Cannes in 2023 and more recently was nominated for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards. It’s easy to see the qualities that enchanted the judges.

The aforementioned toilet cleaner is Hirayama (Koji Yakusho), a quiet and reserved character who has very little to say for himself but who appears to have an almost zen-like appreciation of the world about him. He’s a man who is absolutely committed to his routine and, from the opening scene onward, we share it with him. He wakes in the early hours of the morning in his small but immaculately neat apartment and we travel with him in his van as he listens to a series of vintage songs on his cassette player – The Animals, Van Morrison and (perhaps not surprisingly given the title of the film) Lou Reed.

We work alongside him as he journeys from public toilet to public toilet, ranging from simple-but-functional cubicles to state-of-the-art superloos, sharing his brief interactions with the people he encounters along the way. Not all of them are strangers to him. There’s his feckless young colleague Takashi (Tokio Emoto), endlessly chasing after a woman called Aya (Aoi Yamada) and trying to find ways to earn enough money to go out with her. There’s Hirayama’s teenage niece, Niko (Arisa Nakano), who turns up unannounced at his door one evening after running away from home. And there’s Hirayama’s estranged sister, Keiko (Yumi Aso), who comes to collect her daughter and who cannot understand why her brother is ‘wasting his life’ in such a thankless occupation.

But as the story progresses, we begin to understand that Hirayama isn’t wasting his life. Far from it, he is carrying out important work to the best of his ability, with quiet dignity and determination. Of course, a life so based on routine only needs the slightest glitch to throw everything into turmoil, which happens when Takashi fails to show up one day, leaving Hirayama to do the work of two people…

As Perfect Days unfolds in its calm, understated way, it exerts an increasingly powerful grip on the viewer, gradually revealing more about its central character but always leaving us wanting to know a little more. It’s also true to say that the city of Tokyo is one of the most important characters in the film. Wenders unveils its various charms in so many different lights, from dawn to dusk, from sundown to sunrise. Franz Lustig’s cinematography depicts its back alleys and sidestreets, stares up at its neon lit skylines in a sort of swooning wonder. 

Yakusho’s performance is also a delight, his character saying little but revealing every emotion through his range of expressions, dour and perplexed one moment, on the verge of helpless laughter the next. It all culminates in an extended shot of him driving his van home as Nina Simone’s Feeling Good blasts from the tape deck, Hirayama’s face registering the sheer unadulterated joy of every line.

Some will claim that there’s not enough content here to sustain a two-hour running time, but I would respectfully disagree. This is a little gem of a film and a reminder if ever it were needed that, at the age of 78, Wenders is still a creative force to be reckoned with.

4.4 stars

Philip Caveney

Vanya: National Theatre Live

23/02/24

Cameo Cinema, Edinburgh

I have previously been somewhat baffled by the general adulation heaped upon Andrew Scott. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always thought him a perfectly decent actor, but have somehow failed to appreciate the full depths of his talent.

Until now.

Simon Stephens’ brilliant adaptation of Anton Chekov’s Uncle Vanya features seven characters in a complex tale of a family’s interactions on a remote country estate. All of them are played – perhaps inhabited would be a more accurate word – by Scott. There’s no recourse to any costume changes and the set design amounts to little more than a series of chairs, a piano and a doorway. Scott slips effortlessly from one character to the next, using only slight modulations of voice and tiny mannerisms to tell me instantly who he is at any given moment. The effect is uncanny. The term tour de force is often used but I’ve rarely seen it so consummately earned.

Credit should also go to Stephens, whose script strips the story back to its basics (and slightly updates it) so that all the characters’ motivations are clear from the outset – and to director Sam Yates who keeps the whole enterprise beautifully understated, so that it flows from scene to scene like honey in a heatwave. But the lion’s share of the accolades must go to Scott, who is mesmerising in every role: pompous and self-aggrandising at Aleksandr Sebryakov, the retired professor still obsessed with working on his latest project; smooth and sensual as Aleksandr’s young wife Helena; and painfully self-conscious as his daughter Sofia, who has always been told that she’s ‘plain’.

He’s delightfully gossipy as Maria – the mother of the titular Ivan (Vanya), a hard working man who has selflessly devoted himself to supporting Aleksandr, whom he has idolised since childhood – and wonderfully tragic as Mikhail, the middle-aged country doctor who is desperately in love with Helena.

And finally, he is comically ingratiating as Ilya, an impoverished landowner, now dependent on the goodwill of the Sebryakov family. A delightful running joke has us (and the rest of the cast) forgetting that he’s there, observing everything that happens.

If this sounds hopelessly complicated on paper, fear not. The wonder of this National Theatre Live production is the way in which it glides like gossamer through the cuts and thrusts of a family drama, where even a scene where Scott is obliged to make love to himself unfolds like a dream. Throw in a rendition of Jacques Brel’s heartbreaking ballad If You Go Away and I’m completely sold, a convert to Scott’s evident talent.

Vanya – and Scott – are both extraordinary. If you get the opportunity to see this, I urge you to take it.

5 stars

Philip Caveney

James Acaster: Hecklers Welcome

22/02/24

Edinburgh Playhouse

I can’t complain: I get exactly what I pay for. “Hecklers Welcome” is written right there in big letters. Forewarned is forearmed and all that. But still, I leave the Edinburgh Playhouse tonight feeling disappointed and frustrated. James Acaster might welcome hecklers. It turns out that I don’t.

This show is Acaster’s response to his lockdown realisation that he wasn’t enjoying doing stand-up. That icky feeling waiting in the wings? Not excitement, after all – just nerves. And the audiences, peppered with hecklers and latecomers? They were getting under his skin. Emerging into the post-COVID landscape, the serenity prayer seems to have been his inspiration.

Accept the things he cannot change: hecklers gonna heckle.

So find the courage to alter what he can: his own response.

It’s an interesting social experiment. He’s got more than two hours of finely-crafted material; we can hear it if we want to. It’s all down to our collective will. Sadly, tonight’s three-thousand-strong crowd has more than its fair share of dickheads. I know from social media that there were barely any hecklers yesterday, and that the show ran on until 10.20pm. This evening, the shouter-outers dominate the second half with their inanities. This is why we’re not allowed nice things. Acaster bows out gracefully at 9.45pm.

The first half of the show is as excellent as you’d expect. Acaster is a huge talent, and this show is a fascinating exploration of his love-hate relationship with comedy – an origins-tale, if you like – examining formative experiences such as school assemblies, disastrous dog shows and cub scout membership. It’s all building nicely…

And then: “Poppodoms or bread?” “You’re using the wrong hand!” “It was a Friday!”

Ad infinitum.

They’re like rubbish graffiti artists scrawling their names over a beautiful building. I’m seething. Shut the fuck up.

Acaster takes it in his stride. That’s the rule. It’s only our own time we’re wasting. He’s a five-star comic, but this is a three-star experience. We never get to hear the denouement. Sometimes, other people suck.

3 stars

Susan Singfield

Passages

21/02/24

MUBI

Film director Tomas (Franz Rogowski) is a bit of a shit. His tyranny is evident as soon as we encounter him on set in Paris, berating an actor for failing to display exactly the right amount of nonchalance when walking downstairs. At the wrap party, we learn that the actor is also his husband, Martin (Ben Whishaw), which sets the alarm bells ringing. Just how toxic is their relationship?

Very, it turns out. Martin isn’t really in the mood to party, so Tomas hooks up with Agathe (Adèle Exarchopoulos), a school teacher/film extra. Suddenly, he’s in love with her – and moving out of the marital flat. But when Martin tries to move on too, Tomas proves reluctant to let him go. Before long, he’s got both Martin and Agathe miserably dancing to his tune. Like I said – he’s a shit.

Directed by Ira Sachs, Passages is a fascinating study of unapologetic selfishness. The performances from all three leads are intense and engaging, and Whishaw and Exarchopoulos elicit great sympathy for their characters. However, although Rogowski inhabits the role convincingly, Tomas is so utterly awful from the outset that there’s very little progression. We just see a man behaving badly, over and over – demanding too much from the people he claims to love, while never giving anything in return. I find myself frustrated by both Martin and Agathe’s willingness to indulge him. I’m literally shouting at the screen: “Just tell him no!” (I’m watching this at home, not at the cinema, so the shouting is okay – although I’m not sure that the neighbours agree…)

The world-building is exquisite: there’s no obvious exposition; we’re simply dropped into the characters’ lives, mid-story – but we’re never in any doubt as to what is going on. It’s adroitly done.

There’s no denying the fact that Passages is well directed and beautifully acted – but it’s a film to admire rather than enjoy.

3.4 stars

Susan Singfield