Critical Week: Take a leap

I travelled back from rainy California to icy London this week, having submitted my final ballot for the Golden Globes last weekend. So I look forward to seeing what our international group of critics chose to take home prizes on Sunday night in Los Angeles. I also caught up with two films opening this week: Kristen Stewart's writing-directing debut The Chronology of Water is a challenging arthouse collage, based on a dark memoir. Imogen Poots is superb in the lead role, although the film is a bit too fragmented to pull us in. By contrast, People We Meet on Vacation is a charming and silly romantic comedy (now on Netflix) that's a bit too slick and long, but has some underlying themes that resonate. Plus ridiculously likeable leads in Emily Bader and Tom Blyth. Still, Chloe Zhao's Hamnet is hands down the best film out this week.

I also caught up with the acclaimed German drama Sound of Falling, an ambitious and luxuriant multi-generational epic that continually sends shivers down the spine with its darkly astute observations. Another awards contender, the doc Orwell: 2+2=5 is expertly assembled by Raoul Peck to explore how George Orwell's prescient novels have been echoed in global politics over the past century. It's essential viewing, partly because of the rather terrifying things it says about humanity. And then there were two movies I finally caught up with on the plane flight home: Megan 2.0 is an enjoyably bonkers sequel that is unafraid to get both silly and sharply pointed. I loved it. And gifted filmmaker Kogonada takes a huge swing with A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, a surreal romance starring Margot Robbie and Colin Farrell. It's skilfully crafted, but almost nothing about the story works at all.

Coming up this next week, I'll be watching Chris Hemsworth and Mark Ruffalo in Crime 101, survival horror Primate, Palestinian drama All That's Left of You and catching up on films and TV I haven't had time to watch over the past few weeks. There are also more voting deadlines to contend with.

London Film Fest: Whatever happens, keep smiling

I may have only seen two movies today at the 63rd BFI London Film Festival, but I was in the cinema for five hours and 21 minutes (they were very long films). I also had a couple of filmmaker interviews, which is always good fun - End of the Century's Lucio Castro and Don't Look Down's Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau. And both of these involved a 15-min walk to the venue, so I got my steps in today. We've passed the halfway point now, so I can sense light in the end of the tunnel. Although the queues in the rain for 8am screenings are trying my patience. Here are Tuesday highlights...

Little Monsters
dir-scr Abe Forsythe; with Lupita Nyong'o, Alexander England 19/Aus ***.
Aussie filmmaker Abe Forsythe manages to find a new take on the zombie genre. With a contained Australian setting, he adds a buoyant sense of humour that takes over the entire movie. It's so disarmingly funny, that the audience is genuinely taken aback by how horrifically violent it gets. And even more impressive is how he also generates some properly sweet moments as well.

Bad Education
dir Cory Finley; with Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney 19/US ****
A terrific balance of smart writing, witty direction and skilfully layered performances elevate this true story into a fiendishly entertaining tale of financial malfeasance. Director Corey Finley cuts through the story without getting bogged down in the finely laid out details. He and writer Mike Makowsky also remember to keep the characters compelling even as their outrageous misdeeds are brought into the light.

Vivarium
dir Lorcan Finnegan; with Jesse Eisenberg, Imogen Poots 19/Ire ***
So overtly allegorical that there isn't much to discover, this enjoyably offbeat Irish thriller is compulsively watchable. Filmmaker Lorcan Finnegan creates such a distinctive look that the audience joins in, even if the story never manages a proper surprise. Still, it couldn't be much freakier, using everyday imagery to unhinged effect. And while it may not have much to say about the topic, at least it leaves us feeling queasy.

Matthias & Maxime
dir-scr Xavier Dolan; with Gabriel D'Almeida Freitas, Xavier Dolan 19/Can ***.
There's a bold, bracingly fresh idea at the centre of this film, and actor-filmmaker Xavier Dolan spends much of the running time avoiding it, just as his  characters do. The film is sharply written to catch the rhythms of a 30-something still working out where to go with their lives. And the central story of two lifelong friends has a strong kick, even if it comes a bit late.

The Painted Bird
dir-scr Vaclav Marhoul; with Petr Kotlar, Harvey Keitel 19/Cz ****
Based on the Jerzy Kosinski novel, this sprawling Czech epic takes the audience in an unforgettable odyssey through World War II. Shot in shimmering black and white, scenes look exquisite, giving the film an instantly classic tone. Each episode of this allegory carries an unexpected kick as it reflects real life in bracingly full-on ways. Writer-director Vaclav Marhoul keeps the explicit stuff off-camera, but he still leaves us shaken.

End of the Century [Fin de Siglo]
dir-scr Lucio Castro; with Juan Barberini, Ramon Pujol 19/Arg ****
Observationally shot and beautifully edited, this delicate drama by Argentine filmmaker Lucio Castro pulls the audience in slowly with its striking imagery and relaxed characters. The film's structure is ambitious, with time periods that overlap and echo in unexpected ways, and the enigmatic style of filmmaking makes it surprisingly involving as it plays with the idea of memory, the passage of time and alternate realities... FULL REVIEW >

Links:
Shadows LONDON FILM FEST homepage (full reviews will be linked here) 
Official LONDON FILM FEST site 

Critical Week: Watch the skies

I'm enjoying a quieter life this week after the end of the film festival. Screenings have mainly been smaller films like I Kill Giants, a strikingly well-made teen fantasy drama starring Madison Wolfe (above) and Zoe Saldana. Modern Life Is Rubbish is an engaging if somewhat awkwardly structured British romantic drama with cool musical overtones. Baja is a low-concept, low-energy road trip comedy that never quite hits its stride.

There were two films from Germany: Shelter is a cleverly subtle espionage thriller with very strong characters; and Western sharply explores personal and cultural issues between German workers and locals in rural Bulgaria. From Spain, The Night of the Virgin is a bonkers horror comedy with excessive grisliness and some wobbly storytelling.

Coffee House Chronicles is a multi-strand relationship comedy based on a web-series and featuring a huge number of characters in witty/corny little sketches. And I also managed to catch the live American broadcast version of one of my favourite musicals, Jesus Christ Superstar, a fairly straightforward version of the Webber & Rice classic featuring terrific musicians. John Legend was superb in the title role, but the show-stealing performance came from Brandon Victor Dixon as Judas.

This coming week I'm watching Dwayne Johnson in Rampage, Lily James in The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, teen horror Truth or Dare, designer documentary McQueen, and the Basquiat doc Boom for Real.

Critical Week: Watch the skies...

Secret Cinema presents Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back hit London this past week, and looks set to be a box office presence until it winds up at the end of September. And rightly so: staged with a mind-boggling level of inventiveness, this is a staggering experience that lets the audience live the final sequences of A New Hope (travelling to Mos Eisley, the rebel base and the Death Star itself) and then watch The Empire Strikes Back as part of an epic six-hour evening. MY REPORT >

Other films screened to UK press this week include the gorgeously creative Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy, starring John Cusack, Paul Dano and the great Elizabeth Banks; the corny farce She's Funny That Way, starring Imogen Poots, Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston; and the arty, mannered character study Manglehorn, starring Al Pacino. Further afield there were three uneven but promising low-budget dramas: American posh boys in Those People, a working class British guy in SoftLad, and three Sao Paulo teens in Boys in Brazil.

There were also a few more documentaries. Going Clear is a staggeringly strong doc about Scientology, taking only one side (no one else would talk) but still offering a rare glimpse into the workings of the mysterious religion. The Yes Men Are Revolting furthers the activists' cause with more lively pranks, this time calling attention to the urgency of climate change. And the still ahead-of-its-time experimental 1929 Soviet classic Man With a Movie Camera gets a digital restoration that reminds everyone why it's consistently named one of the 10 best films ever made.

This coming week I only have a couple of screenings before I take a week off, including the WW2 thriller 13 Minutes, the Brazilian drama The Second Mother, the British indie thriller 51 Degrees North and the supernatural gay thriller Angels With Tethered Wings.

Critical Week: Groovy baby

One of the more anticipated films of the year is Jimi: All Is By My Side, a biopic about Jimi Hendrix written and directed by 12 Years a Slave writer John Ridley. The film actually premiered in Toronto last year (alongside 12 Years a Slave), but it was only shown to the UK press this past week. It's bold approach is bound to get an intriguing response when it opens, and not just because the then-25 Hendrix is played by 40-year-old Andre Benjamin.

The other big-name film screened this week was A Walk Among the Tombstones, a gritty mystery thriller starring Liam Neeson an Dan Stevens (comments are embargoed for now). We also caught up with two more festival films: Mr Turner is Mike Leigh's astonishingly fresh and inventive painter biopic starring the Cannes-winner Timothy Spall, and '71 is an episodic but riveting Northern Ireland thriller that's also the latest in Jack O'Connell's full-on assault on cinema, following Starred Up and preceding Angelina Jolie's Unbroken.

With London's FrightFest coming this weekend, there have also been a few horror movies to watch. Life After Beth is a superb comical twist on the zombie genre starring Aubrey Plaza as a teen who doesn't know that she's come back from the dead. Allelulia is a chillingly involving take on the Lonely Hearts Killers from Belgian filmmaker Fabrice Du Welz starring Lola Duenas and Laurent Lucas. And Found is an unnerving and oddly moving hybrid between the coming-of-age and slasher horror genres. Finally, as part of the terrific Dennis Hopper photographic exhibition at the Royal Academy, we had a chance to catch one of his films on the big screen. So I of course chose his lesser-known The Last Movie (1971), a crazed collage set among a film crew shooting a Western in Peru. It's challenging and seriously worth a look for cinephiles.

This coming week we have a very late screening of Frank Miller's Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, Marion Cotillard in the Dardenne brothers' Two Days One Night, Helen Mirren in The Hundred-Foot Journey, the British football movie United We Fall and more horror in The Mirror, among other things.

Critical Week: Rogues gallery

One of the more anticipated press screenings this past week was for The Raid 2, Gareth Evans' sequel to his surprise hit. Although this time he ditches the gritty, linear narrative for a Hong Kong-style corruption epic. There are spectacular moments, although at two and a half hours it's somewhat exhausting. Even bigger (but barely half as long), Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the next episode in Marvel's big-screen serial, with grittier action but less suspense.

Fan-funded mystery Veronica Mars will either give closure to the truncated TV series' cult following or spark a new franchise - it's a lot of fun. An all-star cast makes the Nick Hornby-based comedy-drama A Long Way Down watchable even though it's tonally all over the place. Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return is a weakly animated adventure with an A-list voice cast (Liam Neeson, Lea Michele, Patrick Stewart) and a surprisingly strong plot.

There were also two films from Ireland: John Michael McDonagh's Calvary has the same laconic wit as The Guard, but with even deeper themes, while The Stag is a surprisingly involving bachelor-party comedy with serious edges. The independent American black comedy How to Be a Man has its moments but tries to hard to be rude and wacky, while the German drama Lose Your Head has engaging characters, but never makes much of its intriguing plot.

This coming week, screenings include the franchise wannabe Divergent, the sequels Muppets Most Wanted and Rio 2, Ben Whishaw in the British drama Lilting, the Scandinavian thriller Pioneer and the notorious Canadian black comedy The Dirties. Thursday also sees the opening night of the 28th BFI Flare, one of London's biggest and most important festivals, which runs 20-30 March. Updates on the way...

Critical Week: Sheer ambition

Last week was one for screenings of seriously ambitious movies. Stalingrad is one of the biggest budget Russian epics ever made, documenting the historical pivotal WWII battle as a massive 3D show of heroism. Not exactly the most delicately nuanced movie of the year, but utterly riveting. And then there was Lars Von Trier's two-part Nymphomaniac, a four-hour exploration of the complexities of human sexuality, specifically the feminine variety, through the eyes of a woman who thinks she's an extreme example.

Smaller films were no less inventive. From Belgium, The Strange Colour of Your Body's Tears is a mind-bending odyssey that folds David Lynch into Italian giallo in ways that are disorienting and rather awesome. And from the USA, An Oversimplification of Her Beauty is an involving, kaleidoscopic look at a relationship that never quite was, mainly due to expectations.

As a counterpoint, we had the blunt simplicity of the car racing romp Need for Speed, starring Aaron Paul, Dominic Cooper and Imogen Poots, and the British melodrama The Fold, starring Catherine McCormack as an Anglican priest grappling with grief over the death of her teen daughter. Eerily, both of these costar actresses named Dakota - Johnson (Fifty Shades of Grey) and Blue Richards (The Golden Compass), respectively.

This coming week we have Liam Neeson's airborne thriller Non-Stop, Aaron Eckhart in I Frankenstein, the animated adventure Mr Peabody & Sherman, the remake We Are What We Are, the festival favourite The Rocket and the doc Beyond the Edge. I'll also have a report on the 34th London Critics' Circle Film Awards, which are being held on Sunday night.