THREE FILMS - IN THE HEART OF THE SEA, HE NEVER DIED, THE HATEFUL EIGHT

IN THE HEART OF THE SEA

Moby Dick is in my opinion one of the greatest novels in American literature. I say that not only as a reader but also having taught it in the classroom as a high school literature teacher. This movie recounts the events of the Essex a whaling ship sank by a giant whale and its survivors who were then adrift at sea. This is all told in flashback to Moby Dick author Herman Melville (researching Moby prior to writing it) who is interviewing one of the last survivors, a now middle aged man who was a cabin boy on the doomed ship. Director Ron Howard has a tendency to tell stories in the broadest most general strokes reducing complex people and stories to easy plot points and stereotypes. However, this bracing adventure yarn is fit for this type of direction. Chris Hemsworth (Thor in the current Marvel films) is the most solid and chiseled of action heroes. Only negative part of this otherwise engrossing and interesting tale is the CGI whale which looked completely phony ( compare it to the model whale in the 1956 version of Moby Dick) as well as the greenscreen ocean in general. Still, two hours plus went by like nothing. An interesting scene - Maybe the most genteel declaration of cannibalism I've ever seen in a film. Rather than actually show it, the grown up cabin boy describes in the present day what it involves which actually makes it all the more riveting and tense.

HE NEVER DIED

This is a bad film but one that is highly enjoyable because it is cheesy and laughable but also has a surprisingly good ending. Henry Rollins, who showed more emotion when fronting Black Flag and the Rollins Band, is the most wooden of actors even when breaking out of his usual routine of grunts and shrugs and attempting to show anger. Here he is an immortal being who must take human flesh from time to time to avoid giving into his bloodlust. The plot involves something to do with him finding out he has a daughter and becoming the target of local gangsters (headed by Steven Ogg, Trevor of GTA fame). Low budgeted and looks it. I found the ending which tells who Rollins really is and why he is living this way to be satisfying and the best part of the film. If they ever bring back Mystery Science Theatre 3000, this would be a good movie for them to mock.
 

THE HATEFUL EIGHT

I have never been a fan of Quentin Tarantino. His films are either a complete collection of scenes "borrowed" from other films or hollow, substance free talkathons or a combination of both. THE HATEFUL EIGHT is the latter. Almost three hours in length, the films spends nearly half of its time introducing the characters. Here Kurt Russell transporting fugitive Jennifer Jason Leigh picks up fellow bounty hunter Samuel Jackson and a sheriff (by his own description). A snowstorm forces them to seek shelter in a local resthouse in the middle of nowhere in Wyoming. Other people also trapped in the resthouse may be criminal associates of Leigh. Dull as much as it is interesting and overly impressed with its own dialogue and set-up (both Tarantino trademarks). Tarantino also borrows from himself as the end reminded me slightly of RESERVOIR DOGS, Tarantino's least objectionable film. 

 

THE REVENANT

Director Alejandro Innaritu's follow-up to BIRDMAN (a film I really liked) is not perfect although it is big and entertaining full of breathtaking cinematography and action scenes.

What I liked - There are a number of memorable images - the 15 minute battle shot in frenetic bursts and by a spinning out of control camera between Indians and a hunting party of soldiers and scouts that opens the film, Leonardo DiCaprio being brutally attacked by a bear not once but twice, DiCaprio being sucked down some rapids as he tries to escape from Indians, DiCaprio riding his horse off a cliff into the trees below then disemboweling the dead horse and crawling inside to stay warm, the bloody knife and tomahawk fight at the end with the snow staining red....The panoramic camera angles make the best use of the breathtaking natural beauty....Tom Hardy steals the show as the villainous Fitzgerald and is deserving of a Best Supporting Actor nomination.

What I didn't like - I don't hate Leonardo DiCaprio. He's not my favorite actor but he generally picks good films to star in. I just feel he's miscast here. He doesn't look the part of a stoic supertough scout who could live off the land. Heck, he can't even grow a proper beard....The sub-plot about mistreatment of Native Canadians didn't detract from the overall story but neither did it add a lot - Felt like that should have been a different film....THE REVENANT is two and a half hours long and sometimes felt like it. In particular, I could have done without the two lengthy fever dream sequences. They add nothing to the story and are not particularly creative in how they're shot.

I would still recommend this film because it's so beautifully shot and because the action scenes are gripping and sometimes disturbing. However, it could have been better with a few adjustments (like a more fitting actor in the lead role and edited slightly).

          

THE LOBSTER

The dystopian set-up of THE LOBSTER is an original one - A world, maybe in the future (although it doesn't look futuristic) or maybe an alternate reality, where people who find themselves single must report to a hotel in the country where they have 30 days to find a partner or be transformed into the animal of their choice.  While they are staying in the hotel, the single people can earn extra days of life by helping hunt down "loners"  people who have chosen to remain single and now live in a nearby forest where they commit acts of rebellion against the state.

The hero is played by Colin Farrell whose wife leaves him at the beginning of the film and so he must report to the hotel (bringing along his brother who was there a few years before and was unable to find anybody and is now a dog) where he has a series of adventures and mild SPOILER ends up joining the loners about halfway through the film.

At first I was bit off put by both the use of language and the dialogue.  Characters speak very directly without any trace of irony or humor.  This is done utilizing the Brechtian technique of distancing so as to make it impossible to totally identify with any of the characters.  However, as the film went on and we saw what a different world this is, it all made a kind of sense.

I enjoyed THE LOBSTER.  One of its key strengths is a lot it is actually very funny.  The deadpan humor is expertly written.  The clever idea that is the film's bedrock is only added onto and built up during the narrative.   

What I felt the film was showing was a world where coupling is how the government controls the lives of its citizens (police ask people in public who are alone to show their marriage certificates) not unlike 1984 with its monitoring of all aspects of citizen's lives or BRAVE NEW WORLD with too much sex, drugs, everything destroying the family unit but having the same effect of making people easy to control.

People in this film are forced to base their relationships on trivial similarities such as both being near-sighted or limping or having nice hair.

A slight SPOILER but I believe that in fact people are not turned into animals.  We are never really shown or explained to how this happens but a brainwashed population believes it.  Most likely they are just killed.

I've seen two of Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos' other films DOGTOOTH and ALPS.  They used many of the same odd techniques (speech patterns, weird relations, strange settings) but this is his first English language film and his best so far.  I hope his next film is equally imaginative and thought provoking.    

 

     

FIVE FILMS - THE WAVE, TAG, SCOUTS GUIDE TO THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, #HORROR, ASMODEUS

THE WAVE

This Norwegian disaster movie features a lot of standard plot details of the genre - Foreshadowing through various warning signs, a hero who is not believed at first about what is to come, fear of disturbing the local tourist industry, family separated during the actual event, finding each other after it is over. The disaster here is an avalanche that creates a massive tsunami in a fjord. It's a solid thriller and a very traditional disaster film- something I haven't seen in awhile. Good entertainment. I wish there had been more scenes of the giant wave- That part is very quick. 

 
TAG

Director Sion Sono's prolificness is matched only by his weirdness. This film whose narrative style reminded me of David Lynch features a schoolgirl who transforms into a bride about to get married and then a marathon runner all the while dodging a killer wind that cuts people in half, homicidal well armed school teachers, and a man wearing a pigs head as a mask. In the end, I'm not sure what it was all about despite an attempted explanation at the end. Something about the nature of reality and fiction. I liked the visuals and it was a stimulating movie as you try to figure out what is going on. This made up for the emptiness at the heart of art without meaning. I wouldn't necessarily recommend it but I did enjoy it on a purely entertainment level (which is perhaps not what the director intended) 

 
SCOUTS GUIDE TO THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

Filled with gross out jokes, this paint by numbers zombie horror flick at least gives us a slight variation on the typical undead. Here the infected are the result of a bio-weapon accidentally released from a lab. There are fast zombies and also animal zombies. The three teenage cub scout heroes team up with a stripper. Fast paced, filled with gory gags ( this is more of a comedy than a horror/comedy). The best part is the always reliable David Koechner as a scoutmaster with a Dolly Parton fixation. Entertaining but not memorable. 

 
#HORROR

Not sure what this film was about. The only real horror parts are at the very beginning and at the very end. The rest is teenage mean girls carrying out teenage mean girl behavior with some artistic flourishes particularly in the social media game the characters play throughout. Looks nice but ultimately not very scary. There's message in there too about mean girls and social media but it is lost in the muddle.

ASMODEUS

Low Budget talky limp horror about a serial killer loose in a halfway house for female convicts. Spends a lot of time building up the character's personalities and back histories which I liked but the actual horror part is not particularly well directed and the narrative is wildly uneven.

FOUR FILMS - LISTEN TO ME MARLON, DEEP DARK, EVEREST, CONDEMNED

LISTEN TO ME MARLON

Documentary on Marlon Brando whose narrative tool is mostly audio tapes Brando made where he discusses his life and feelings in full. This is intercut with iconic scenes from his films and interviews he did. I loved it but I am a Brandophile and that is who this film is largely aimed at. It is loosely chronological as Brando discusses his early years, his troubled relationships with his parents (especially his dad), his introduction to acting and first bushes with fame, his most famous roles, his political activism, Tahiti, his son killing his daughter's boyfriend etc. Brando is at his most eloquent when he philosophizes. At the point where he made these tapes he understood what an illusion his life is and it is amazing to hear him talk so negatively about acting which he revolutionized. The filmmaker does a very good job of keeping the flow interesting through good use of stock footage and Brando highlights. A must for Brandophiles and I would say also entertaining for anyone else.  

                                             

DEEP DARK

Some interesting visuals and general weirdness keep this film slightly interesting. The human blood donating mobile for example. However, the main story of a failed artist who gets guidance from a creepy female voice in a hole in the wall of his apartment moves is too slow and uneventful to hold the attention for long. Not really much happens until the very end and then the gory violence feels forced.
      

EVEREST

For what I'm assuming is a big budget film with lots of name stars based on well known true story and a successful book about this incident, this is a surprisingly uninvolving, sloppily made film. For one thing, many of the action scenes which occur during heavy snowfall make it impossible to tell the identities of the characters. This ruins the set-up of each character's backstory earlier in the film and all the effort in getting the audience to care about them. Dull and confusing, a total waste of a large budget. 

 

CONDEMNED

One of the sub-genres that has proliferated in the last decade or so with REC, THE HORDE and others is that of people trapped in a building or other enclosed space with people infected with some kind of zombie or otherwise homicidal virus. This film is about squatters in a rundown building and adds nothing except truly grotesque scenes of BDSM, pee drinking, etc in the interests of establishing "character". A movie that should be avoided at all costs.

SIX FILMS - THE END OF THE TOUR, BONE TOMAHAWK, THE MARTIAN, HOWL, THE HALLOW, SUSPENSION

THE END OF THE TOUR

The irony is while I am not a fan AT ALL of David Foster Wallace's writing (Self involved babble, Thomas Pynchon without a good editor), this is a very good movie. What I like most about it is it primarily consists of conversation and it's good conversation (Of course it's based on a real interview that was documented on cassette). Feels like genuine discourse not some Hollywood screenwriter's version of how intelligent people talk. I watched the real Wallace on You Tube after seeing this film and Jason Segal has really got him down - it's uncanny. If anything, the film Wallace is more likable less affected and pretentious than real life Wallace. Jesse Eisenberg is annoying and weaselly as usual but it totally fits the role here. 

 

BONE TOMAHAWK

What makes this quirky horror western different is its strange freeform dialogue and diffident pacing technique. The movie takes itS time to reach the violent conclusion. Cannibal inbred troglodytes kidnap Patrick Wilson's wife and others. Wilson (nursing a broken leg), Kurt Russell (as the local sheriff), Richard Jenkins (as an elderly deputy), and Matthew Fox (as a cool gunfighter) go after them. Jenkins in particular is memorable - His conversations about reading in the bathtub and a flea circus are inspired scenes. Good performances, excellent script, unexpectedly eccentric characters. Worth seeing.

 
THE MARTIAN

Keeping intact the credible science and detail of the book, this movie is a thinking man's action thriller, as much science fact as science fiction. At times, it reminds me of a Discovery channel space show. My only complaint is that there are moments that feel padded out - Cutting out 20 minutes or so would have made it a leaner, tenser thriller. Large number of good actors and actresses featured in supporting roles.

HOWL

There is not that much you can do with werewolves other than differ the location of where one encounters them. Here a commuter train outside London that has broken down is beset by not one werewolf SPOILER but a whole pack. The director takes some time to establish all the stereotypes - Schlubby hero who saves the day, female co-worker the hero has a crush on, self-centered rich ahole, old couple, brainy Asian. The werewolves themselves have an imaginative look and the scares and action scenes are solid. Decent and it sets up the horror conflict scenes well. 

 

THE HALLOW

Average creature horror film with two things going for it - 1.) Moving quickly into the horror without much build-up (Most of the action takes place in one night) 2.) Good makeup effects....The creatures do indeed look icky. These two plus points however are not enough to save this film from mediocrity.

SUSPENSION

Truly mundane slasher thriller that bets the whole narrative on a surprise ending that is visible from a 100 miles away. The heroine turns in a decent performance and there's plenty of bright red blood which are the only good things I can say about this film.

FIVE FILMS - THE SAND, THE FINAL GIRLS, TALES OF HALLOWEEN, KNOCK KNOCK, THE GREEN INFERNO

THE SAND

BLOOD BEACH is one of my favorite all time B horror movies with the main reason the inventive monster that lives under the sand and kills and eats people. THE SAND has a different location and plot but mines much of the same territory. This is pretty good thriller with a bunch of hungover college students stuck on a beach with a hungry something that will eat them the moment they touch the sand. Well directed, well paced, excellent set-up of suspenseful scenes. Only complaint cheap CGI effects but they don't get in the way too much

THE FINAL GIRLS

Clever, funny, and meta to the bone. Teenagers find themselves trapped in a famous slasher film starring one of the main teen's mothers who has died in real life. Knows the in and outs of slasher mythology enough that this feels like a primer on the genre. My only criticism is spends so much time talking and on set-up, I wish there were more scary scenes and action. Love the faux trailer at the beginning and the twist at the ends. A movie made by people who really know slasher films. 

 

TALES OF HALLOWEEN

The set-up here is ten short horror stories by ten different directors about Halloween. Most of them don't have much in the way of surprise endings which should be a given for horror anthologies. My two favorites were Trick and The Night Billy Raised Hell both of which balance humor, gore, and shocks into ten minutes or so. The rest of the stories had some thrilling moments but either had a flat premise or were not very artfully told or both. 

 

KNOCK, KNOCK

What was the point of this film exactly? There is no explanation at the end and what the two female antagonists do to home alone married Keanu Reeves isn't particularly sadistic or creative. The most entertaining part of this Eli Roth film is where Reaves finally loses it and tells the girls what he thinks of them. Reaves is such a bad actor, the lack of conviction in that scene is very amusing. This is apparently a remake of an obscure 1970's film and also has echoes of FUNNY GAMES but it is all forgettable and meaningless. Two positives - The glossy look suits the subject matter and Ana De Armas and Lorenza Izzo are both suitably convincing as the menacing young females.

THE GREEN INFERNO

It's a twofer for Eli Roth. Combining a semi-remake of CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST with a weird take on environmental activism might have looked good non paper but it is a bloody mess (literally). No tension, not much story, only gross man eating man violence. Lorenza Izzo, who was also in KNOCK KNOCK and is Roth's wife in real life, is a decent enough heroine which is the only good thing I can say about this film.