Halloween Ends (2022)

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Quick Synopsis: The final (for now) film in the long-running Halloween franchise.

Initial reviews for this were not promising. Early indications were that this was a massive disappointment, one of the most disappointing and poorly written horror films of the year. I was okay with that, people hated Halloween Kills and I actually preferred it to the original (by which I mean the sequel). A lot of people hate when movies go weird, yet I tend to like it. I crave originality and weirdness, and I tend to have an affection for things which are weird and unloved (except myself, obviously, even I have limits), so whilst I knew there was a chance I’d dislike this, there was an even higher chance that everybody else was a big stupid doo-doo head and were wrong. There have been many films in the past that I have LOVED and yet haven’t seemed to receive that same love from critics and large audiences; Table 19 being the most obvious, but even Ghostbusters: Afterlife, which I actually dreaded watching because of early reviews, yet was one of my highlights of last year. Maybe this would continue that run.

Spoilers, it doesn’t. This is not a good film. It feels like a cheap knock-off of the last two films and I struggle to comprehend it’s by the same people. What I loved about Halloween Kills is how it felt like a natural progression, that is how a town would react, with suspicion and fear. For a few days at least the whole place would be a powder keg ready to ignite. Kills was about a town in recovery, Ends is about a town in denial. Think of how Kills ended: Michael Myers was surrounded by a group of townspeople, and he killed them all and walked on. How would a town react to a seemingly unkillable monster wreaking havoc and killing everybody before walking off and not being seen again? Well, according to this film the town responds by doing absolutely nothing. Towns don’t do that with tragedies, large sprawling cities might, but there’s nothing to suggest Haddonfield is like that. Look at places which have fallen victim to mass shootings, they’re still haunted by it. There’s a multitude of different interesting ways this film could have gone, it could have the town turn into a police state, ruled by fear and giving up liberties “for the greater good”. It could have been a weird tourist spot, where the town’s inhabitants are forced to relive their worst day, again and again, to bring money in. It could have even have been a hotspot for conspiracy theorists who deny the killings exist, like those cuntheads Richard D Hall and Alex Jones do. There’s nothing in this which makes it feel like a town in recovery.

It’s not even the town, the named characters seem inconsistent too. Between the two Halloween films (the 70’s one, and the 2010’s one) Laurie Strode spent the time in fear of Michael Myers coming back. So what does she do now that Myers has come back and killed her daughter? She moves into a cosy house and lives a normal life. Logically, she would have thought “my defences weren’t enough, I need to be stricter”, not the other way around.

How about Myers himself? It’s hard to tell as he’s barely in it. The Michael/Laurie showdown is what the films advertising campaign was based around, so it’s disappointing that it’s really the only part he’s in. I’m all for different sequels, but this is a poor way to end this story. If it was the second film in this modern trilogy, it would be more acceptable. But having this as the closer feels like a waste of a story. The end of the film itself is spectacular. and is the perfect ending to the story. It’s good that it does have a definitive ending to the saga, but the rest of this film is pointless. It hints that the Evil that is haunting Myers will continue, and it’s that source infecting Corey (the new killer in this movie) that caused him to break bad.

I’m not opposed to a film about someone taking on the mantle of Myers and going on a killing spree. But the way it’s done here is baffling, Corey accidentally kills a child (in a great scene), is demonised by the town, and nearly dies. Perfect for a “I will get revenge on this town by bringing back their worst nightmare” story. But this isn’t that, what seems to happen is Michael goes to kill Corey, they look eyes and share a moment which turns him evil. Corey had enough of a backstory that would have explained his motives, and the magic eye soul bullshit thing just muddies the water. I would argue it’s worse than the Martha scene from BvS.

There is definitely an evil force that is haunting this film, ruining everything and making things worse for everybody. But it’s not Evil, it’s Corey. I mentioned his character’s relationship with Michael being weird, but his relationship with Laurie’s niece Allyson makes both Laurie and Allyson seem worse characters. It forces both of those characters to act really inconsistently. Laurie is writing a self-help book about not letting fear rule your life, but Allyson accuses her of being too negative, purely to cause a narrative split. It’s a shame as all the performers are great, from a technical standpoint it’s superb. It’s directed well, the soundtrack is brilliant, and it looks fantastic. But it’s hampered by possibly the worst script I’ve seen all year.

This was supposed to be the end of the Halloween saga, but all it’s done is make me want another one, but this time good. This CAN’T be how this franchise ends, it’s too shit. It should have gone out on a high, not gone out as if it was written by people who were high.

Amsterdam (2022)

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Quick synopsis: Three friends who witness a murder, become suspects themselves, and uncover one of the most outrageous plots in American history.

This should be the type of film I like. It’s a star-filled cast in a movie based on an underknown aspect of American history (the Business Plot of 1933), it should be fun. If not fun, it should be interesting and a fascinating watch.

It’s not though, despite having all the ingredients of a film I like, the end result just didn’t do anything for me. I think a big issue is the pacing, it’s far too long, and doesn’t use the time well. It spends far too long setting up the mood and time, meanwhile, the narrative itself stands still. A good story is a long-distance runner, it varies the pace when it needs to so it keeps momentum until the end. This film approaches narrative like I approached long-distance running, going way too fast for a minute, and then having to stop for 5 minutes to get my breath. It’s really unfocused, giving us backstories and explanations that we don’t really need.

It also has a huge tonal problem. The subject is very serious, about an attempted coup against the United States government, and the mistreatment of veterans from the first world war. Yet the film is written, directed, and performed like a madcap caper. As the Western World is flirting with fascism, showing the concept of dictatorships our thighs and fluttering eyelashes, it’s hard to take films like these as lightweight. Especially when it’s trying to make parallels to modern times (as in, times which are modern, not the Charlie Chaplin film, which is actually more relevant today). The film wants to be taken seriously whilst not being a serious film. “hey, the threat of fascism is looming and business owners want to control every aspect of your life and kill those you hold dea-oh look, someone fell over, tee-hee”. It also doesn’t feel like the characters are taking it seriously, they all seem too self-aware that they’re not in any danger because they’re the main characters.

It’s a shame as the story is one that should be told, just not by this writer. Adam McKay would have been a better shout to do this. The way he handled The Big Short shows that he can do films of this nature well. David O.Russell doesn’t feel the right choice for this. Then again, I didn’t like Joy or American Hustle much either, so maybe it’s just I don’t vibe with his style. The performances are also really good, there’s not really a weak link, and the three leads have excellent chemistry.

It’s also very very funny. Getting some great reactions from the people I was in the cinema with. Not just small laughs, full-on belly laughs that you rarely get in audiences. I feel this could be edited into a better film, but at the moment it’s just too much of a challenge to get through. I might watch it again if it’s on Netflix and I can skip certain parts. But I’m not going to go out of my way to see it. Mainly because it feels like a film, and more like a drunk guy at the pub telling you a story.

Emily (2022)

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Quick synopsis: A biographical film about Emily Brontë, and the writing of her most famous work, a shopping list. No, wait, Wuthering Heights.

It’s weird, this film is supposed to be about the writing of Wuthering Heights, but it doesn’t feature Kate Bush at all. Plus it’s set in the 1840s instead of the 1970s. Such a basic lack of fact-checking. Oh, it turns out Wuthering Heights is not just a banger of a tune, it’s also a book (Books: they’re like television shows for your eyes), huh, the things you learn.

I’m not that familiar with Wuthering Heights, or the work of any of the Brontë sisters truth be told. I worried this would hinder my enjoyment of it. There was a high chance that I just wouldn’t vibe with this film, not just because I don’t know much about the sisters, but also because I tend to not like period films that much. And for a lot of this film’s opening, I was uninterested in this film. It felt like the characters were taking some things far too seriously and ignoring obvious truths which would reduce their anxiety. My fears were justified, I was bored, and I had started to tune out.

Now I’m about to say something I wish wasn’t true. The Brontë sisters are important in a literary sense, and are among the most famous female writers of all time, coming from a time when women were legally second-class citizens. So any story about them has to be feminist AF for it to work, which makes the following sentence make me feel shitty for saying: the film gets a lot better once her brother enters the spotlight more. There’s a turning point where he and Emily are talking and it tells you so much about who Emily is. It’s the first time you see the dynamism and excitement that she has. It’s the first time that she feels like an actual human instead of a character. The two actors have undeniable chemistry and I hope they work together in the future.

I have no idea how historically accurate this is, so I can’t judge it based on that. I can only judge on what I see, and what I see is slightly frustrating at times. As I said, the opening doesn’t do a great job of drawing you in, and the main romance that’s central to the plot feels lacking. Hard to explain why, they have good chemistry, and the way it ends is heartbreaking, it just doesn’t feel quite as real as it should. I think it’s because the meet-cute moment doesn’t land. As I said, the way it ends is brilliant, but the way it starts feels a bit rushed and forced. The performances are great though, the only time I’ve seen Emma Mackey in something was Death On The Nile, where I described her as “distractingly like Lucy Hale, but better”. None of that here, she is completely different and knocks every moment out of the park. Fionn Whitehead has a good energy to him, although I did spend a lot of the film wondering where I knew him from, I thought I was just getting him confused with Matthew Baynton, but now I know he was in possibly the best episode of Inside No. 9. I’m really looking forward to seeing what the two of them do next.

This is the first film directed by Frances O’Connor, best known for her performances in Mansfield Park, Importance Of Being Earnest, and Madame Bovary. I would not have guessed this is her first film as a director. It’s very ambitious, she doesn’t approach it as a standard period film, she uses handheld shots, dynamic camera movement during chases, and very dark colours to give it a slightly modern feel. It doesn’t always work, the scene where characters are getting drunk feels very poorly edited. I get what she was going for, but it didn’t really work. There are some moments when the visual language is unclear and it can be frustrating and difficult to watch. But when it’s good, it’s very good. Although I do have the feeling her future is not in period dramas, but in horror. There are a few scenes in here which are directed as if they’re in horror movies, and I’d love to see her do one. Not a modern slasher, but a retro-style ghost story.

It’s strange, I’m not sure I learnt any facts about Emily, but it did give me great insight into who she was. I’m not sure I could pass a multiple-choice exam on her, but this did give me an understanding of her character to the point where I could probably BS my way through an essay on her. Worth a watch, but not essential.

The Lost King (2022)

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Quick Synopsis: Philippa Langley (Sally Hawkins) thinks she knows where the lost body of Richard III is buried, and is determined to prove it to an establishment that doesn’t believe her.

If I wrote this review the minute I left the cinema, it would have been more favourable. But now that time has passed, it’s soured my opinion on it. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing bad about it. You don’t walk out thinking you’ve wasted your time, but it doesn’t stay with you.

The cast is all good: Steve Coogan provides enough character without overshadowing the lead, and Mark Addy seems weirdly Reece Shearsmith. Sally Hawkins continues to be one of the best performers around. She is starting to run the risk of playing similar characters though. A lot of her biggest roles are now “slightly downtrodden mother who stands up to people”. There’s a reason for that though, she is so good at it. Her characters naturally have a slight fragility to them, and she has haunting eyes which make it easy to sympathise with her when things go against her. Plus she does a great “shakey scared voice”. But there’s not much in her performance that you haven’t seen before, as good as it is (and it is very good), it doesn’t feel unique to this film.

She’s not helped by some weird script choices, the “ghost” of Richard III has the usual Television Dream Ghost qualities, pointing out stuff she already knew. But then there are moments where it feels like he’s leading her places, and so that he does have sentience and independent thought. If they dialled down on that it would improve it somewhat, and make it feel like her character has more agency rather than “a ghost told me”.

Another misstep in the script is it plays out like we don’t know what happened. That may work overseas, but the discovery of his body was a big deal in the UK, so when the film does try to have the tension of “will they find it?”, it doesn’t feel true. We know he was found in a car park in Leicester, so there’s zero drama to the story. I know it’s in bad form to add things which weren’t there for dramatic purpose, but I feel this needed it. It needed a B-story that it could use for drama and suspense. At the very least it can stop pretending that we don’t know what happens.

I should point out that there is some controversy surrounding the other archeologists involved in the dig. They say they’re being labelled the villains in the story unfairly, and that in reality they were helpful. Which, considering the crux of the movie was “Richard III was unfairly made a villain by Shakespeare”, is kind of ironic.

In summary, this is fine. It’s a pleasant enough watch but I’m not sure I need to watch it again. It’s a standard British movie, for better and for worse. It will make you feel things while watching it, but you’ll be hard-pushed to remember that much about it a month down the line. That’s its biggest weakness: how disposable it is. It’s based on a true story, but they changed so much of it that it doesn’t really matter that much. They change so much of the true story that it doesn’t work as a “learn about what happened” piece. Films are supposed to change you, make you feel, and importantly, make you ask questions. But really the only feeling this gives you, is that you should watch a documentary about it instead. It also made me think of this song. Which is a plus, I suppose.

We’re All Going To The World’s Fair (2021)

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Quick synopsis: Alone in her bedroom, Casey (Anna Cobb) takes part in an online horror challenge, one which affects her sanity in this coming-of-age horror from Jane Schoenbrun.

This is weird. I’m still not entirely sure if I liked it or not. I am very glad I’ve seen it, and it is one that I would recommend, but my personal thoughts on it are still going through my head. I’ll admit, I tend to avoid a lot of films like this because they all run together in my mind. The “teen challenge horror” has seen a resurgence lately, and a lot of them have been cheap and kind of shit. I was ready to put this on the file of “nah, won’t bother watching” alongside Slenderman (and where Truth Or Dare should have been). I then realised Anna Cobb was in it. I thought she was the best part of How To Deter A Robber last year so I thought would be interesting. She seemed really different in this though, there was none of the Anna Kendrick-ness to her this time round, which surprised me. It was like she was a completely different person. There’s a reason for that, this was Anna Cobb, that was Abbi Cobb, a completely different actress. I feel that that paragraph may be a disservice to Anna as she is really good in this. She has incredibly expressive eyes. This is her feature debut, and she nails it. I’m really looking forward to what she does next. She’s one of the best things about this film. Although that’s easy to say, as she’s one of the only things about this film. It’s incredibly minimalist, most of the film is her on her own, talking to a camera. I don’t recall a moment of her sharing the screen with anybody at any time. There are moments where she’s talking to someone offscreen, or via webchat, but most of it is just her. Weirdly, it doesn’t end with her. The ending is a guy talking, a guy who is possibly being an unreliable narrator. The film is at its weakest when it’s not on Casey, so it’s frustrating when the film closes not on a different character. The closing is just too long and too much nothing. Much like the opening.

The opening could, and should have been shorter, it’s about 8 minutes of her sitting in front of the camera doing the challenge (saying a phrase three times, smearing blood on the computer, then sitting in front of strobe lights). Could have been done in about 3 minutes and achieved the same. The film itself is only 85 minutes, so that’s almost a 10th of the film doing nothing. It also sets up the film as being something different from what it is, since the whole intro is from the POV of her webcam, it makes you think the whole film will be like that, certainly the minimalist cast would lead you to believe that. It’s not, it mostly is, but the moments where it’s not that don’t add to it. It is kind of a wasted opportunity, the nature of the story would lend itself to her being viewed on a camera or computer screen at all times. Cobb is such a good performer, and has such brilliant facial expressions that it kind of feels like a waste when the film has moments of scenery with her talking over them. As beautiful as the scenes look, you want to see her. This film is at its best when it doesn’t feel like a film. When it feels like home recordings that you’re weirdly intruding on. If the film was entirely recordings from a camera, then the ending of the male character would have a bigger impact. It would put us in his shoes as a voyeur, watching this character on a screen and becoming obsessed with her.

It’s a shame as the writing and directing has potential. It’s strangely hypnotic. It’s the cinematic equivalent of a lava lamp. You don’t watch and think about character and plot, you’re just entranced by everything and lose track of time while observing. The whole thing feels very personal, but also like it should have been a short. It shows promise, it shows potential, but it also shows limitations and inexperience. I expect both Cobb and Schoenbrun (the writer/director) to do great things in the future. Schoenbrun has a great sense of how to make things creepy. But only in short bursts, it struggles to keep that momentum throughout. The scenes themselves are super strange and well done; one in particular where someone seems to be digging into their own arm and pulling out a reel of tickets. It’s moments like that which make you wonder about what the film could have been. Personally, I think this should have been a series of shorts. So we get to see the effects the game has on different people. Would allow the film to maintain momentum and showcase what Shoenbrun is best at: weird shit.

So yeah, see this. Turn the lights off, shut the curtains, turn your phone off, and just be enraptured by what you’re watching. It’s not for everybody, but you won’t see anything else like this. For some reason, it reminded me of the indie game Gone Home (which if you haven’t played, I highly recommend), no idea why. It also has an absolute killer soundtrack which I’ve already purchased.

The Bubble (2022)

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Quick synopsis: The cast and crew of a blockbuster action franchise attempt to shoot a film while quarantining at a posh hotel

I don’t think I trust Apatow as a writer anymore. The last thing of his I really enjoyed was Trainwreck, and that was something he directed, didn’t write. Other than that, lately, his stuff just seems like it’s all just deleted scenes from other movies. Funny People was far far too long, This Is 40 just seemed kind of cruel, and a lot of times his characters are unsympathetic. Plus he casts like he’s still a young up-and-comer, casting his friends and family whenever he can. I do wish Apatow would stop casting his family members in major roles. I get he wants to see them in it, and he can trust them easily. But I don’t think Iris Apatow was the best choice as one of the main cast. I’m not saying that being Apatow’s daughter is what caused her to get the role, but I have a feeling it was. I really don’t get how she was the best option for the role. Especially when Maria Bakalova was cast in the film in a smaller role. An ensemble-cast film like this means you can’t have any weak links, and having someone as inexperienced as her alongside performers like Karen Gillan, Pedro Pascal, and Keegan-Michael Key just makes her inexperience stand out even more.

But maybe Judd Apatow’s writing saves this? Nope. The whole thing feels like a first draft. It’s really weirdly paced. You’ll have a two-minute scene set during the day, then a short one set at night, and then another one set in the day. It’s just weird and means you don’t get a good grounding of time passing. Time passes so quickly that you don’t really get that feeling of suffocation. It also repeats itself, as well as repeating itself, and worse of all; it repeats itself. There’s a montage of the characters in the second quarantine where some are just drinking and doing drugs, some are going crazy with the quarantine, and some are learning lines. It kind of feels like it should have been shown during the first quarantine section. Would have been a good introduction to the characters, as it is, it’s just confirming personalities we’ve already seen. It’s a repeating of a situation we’ve already seen, and it’s not entertaining to see it again that long into the film. It’s like the whole plot has been brought back to the start. The way that montage ends is weird too, it doesn’t have a definitive end, just cuts to a scene of characters talking, so it makes it seem like those characters are breaking the isolation bubble. It would be very in character for them to do so, and they actually do that, sneaking out (in a scene which either didn’t happen or if it did, was very forgettable).

That’s not the only montage btw, there are quite a few of them, and most of them are pretty bad. It feels like the film is trying to aim itself at the TikTok crowd. It’s trying SO hard to be young and “hip”, that it just comes off like it’s as old-fashioned as someone in their 30s who still uses the word “hip”. Maybe that was done because montages are good ways to show characters quickly, and this film has so many characters that juggling them is difficult. It fails at that, btw. Most of the characters are ridiculously underdeveloped. It doesn’t help that we only see them at their worst, so we don’t really get a sense of who they are. They’re not helped by the dialogue they’re given. “you remember the reviews from your last film Jerusalem Rising”. That is a terrible sentence because it just feels really fake. I don’t think you’d mention the film title, or you’d mention just that. You’d say either “you remember the reviews from your last film”, OR “you remember the reviews from Jerusalem Rising”, it’s weird they mention both. Feels fake. It’s just blatant exposition, and it’s terrible that it’s one of the first lines in the film.

The film also starts with the hotel staff being briefed. They’re the best parts of the film, and if it was focused more on them it would be a better film. It would allow us to see the Hollywood lifestyle from the outside, and get a better view of the madness. As it is, the Hollywood stars are the main characters, so it feels too much like rich people watching other rich people. It’s incredibly toothless as a satire of film-making. It’s the film equivalent of government-approved satire. It doesn’t have a point to make, it’s just surface-level jokes.

On the plus side, I did get a kick out of a character being called Bola, mainly because I called a character that in a script and it’s nice to see a name like that used by actual filmmakers. Most of the cast are good, and the central idea is fine. It also does a good job of setting up the fictional franchise. It has moments where the potential shines through, but they’re quite rare. Really the main issue is one bad piece of casting, and a bad script. So that’s ALL Apatow. If he was replaced, and everything else the same (the casting, the concept etc), it would have the potential to be one of the best of the year. As it is? Bitterly disappointing. Oh, it also has a really awkwardly funny moment with Beck singing a song about dinosaurs. And a Miley Cyrus cover of Blondie.

A Hero (2021)

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Quick Synopsis: Rahim Soltani (Amir Jadidi) is out of debtors prison on weekend release. His partner found a bag full of gold and they plan to use it pay off his debts. When they find out it’s not enough to cover the debt, Rahim pretends he found it and tries to track down the owner and make use of good publicity.

Ah man, I wish I did some research before watching this. I liked this film, it was an engaging story and it was very well written. But the director/writer stole it from a student in a class he was teaching. It’s very heavily (by which I mean, it’s practically the same story) as a documentary made by Azadeh Masihzadeh whilst she was a student in a workshop being taught by Farhadi. Farhadi forced Masihzadeh to sign a document saying that the idea was all his. So yeah, the writer/director is a prick, and I don’t want to praise him, but I have to. If this film was terrible I could make jokes about how much I hated it, and how not only is he bereft of morality, but he’s also bereft of talent. If it was mediocre, I could ignore it like I have one or two other films. But this is too good to ignore. It’s a very human story about the nature of doing good, and whether the motives of a good deed affect the altruism of the act. It also has a lot to say about how people respond to good deeds: with people lining up to exploit the act until it gets out of hand and the person who does the act no longer has ownership of how it’s perceived.

As much as he is a prick, Farhadi is a good director, knowing exactly when to let silence happen. The opening has barely any dialogue, it’s possible it had none, I’m not just confident enough to say that for certain. Most of the opening 5 minutes is just him walking to meet someone, but the locations are so beautiful that you’re not bored watching it. The long walk also highlights just how determined he is, plus he’s just got out of prison, so he’s probably just enjoying the smell of fresh air instead of the smell of rape and pee corners (it’s why I don’t take late trains from Kings Cross). The character is played by Amir Jadidi, and he’s the entire anchor the film is based around. His character could come off as someone who is self-serving and selfish (and he kind of is, but never in a way that makes him unlikeable), or he could come off as pitiful and pathetic. Jadidi makes him someone you want to root for, he’s very likeable and charming, in situations that he started but are now out of his control. It’s essentially an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, just without the laughs. His relationship with his girlfriend feels very natural too. They have really good chemistry and the scenes of them together on screen are lovely to watch. It’s a relationship you can buy into easily, you can see why they’d do the things for each other that they do.

The background characters are all well-portrayed too. Even the person he owes money to, the person who is, for all intents and purposes, the antagonist, is seen as sympathetic. He’s (rightly) annoyed that Jadidi’s character is seen as a hero just for handing the bag back in, he doesn’t see why that’s a good thing, and not just, you know, normal. His frustration that the person who owes him A LOT of money is being held up as a paragon of virtue, meanwhile he’s seen as the bad guy for, you know, wanting the money he is owed.

So in summary, watch it, just try to ignore how horrifying the concept of “debtors prisons” are in the first place.

See How They Run (2022)

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Quick synopsis: A depressed alcoholic and bitter Inspector (Sam Rockwell) works alongside an enthusiastic new Constable (Saoirse Ronan) to solve a *adopts accent* MURDAH!

I absolutely adore a good WhoHasDoneThis? (which as B99 fans know, is the grammatically correct way to refer to films in the Whodunit genre). A great whohasdonethis film contains my favourite things to watch: great ensemble cast, a stylistic look to them, and a clever script. I love being surprised in films, and whohasdonethis films provide those in spades. Well, good ones do anyway. Bad ones are far too obvious, the audience should never reach the correct conclusion of the reveal before the film itself does, but the reveal has to make enough sense that when it does happen you feel kind of stupid for not getting it.

The person who is generally referred to as being the best when it comes to this genre: Agatha Christie. A lot of modern stories in the genre are heavily in her debt, and invite comparisons. The smart thing to do in this situation is to lean away from it, remove anything that can cause people to compare it to Christie. Especially if you’re a director (Tom George) making his first feature length film, and a writer (Mark Chappell) who has mainly made television. You want to keep it fairly safe and do something very un-Christie, to avoid comparisons to one of the greats. That’s the smart and logical thing to do.

They decide to go “fuck that” and lean so far into Christie comparisons that they’re basically shunting her work. It’s a very brave thing to do, and one that runs the risk of being a spectacular failure. Somehow it’s not. This film has an uphill battle to work, and climbs that hill admirably. Everything about it just works. The story is one you’re invested in, a believable case could be made for any of the characters, all who are fleshed out enough that if they were revealed you wouldn’t sit there wondering “who’s that?”. It has a visual style that’s reminiscent of the LA Noire games, some truly beautiful use of focus in some of the shots. The script is clever, keeping you entertained throughout. I mean, there’s one point where it literally tells you the ending, and when it happens you can’t help but laugh and be impressed. It’s also really funny, getting a lot of genuine laughs from people in the screen I was at. The performances are perfect, everybody is at their best. Saoirse Ronan, in particular, needs highlighting as a ball of energy who you love to see, her joyous outlook is infectious and every moment she’s on screen is a delight to watch. Sam Rockwell is good, and make no mistake, he’s a huge get for a film like this, but, I dunno, part of me feels it should have been David Tennant and I have no idea why, he was never linked to it at all, but it feels like the kind of role he’d do well in.

On the downside, there is a slight loss in momentum as it heads into the final third. The final section itself is brilliant, but the lead into it is a little forgettable. It’s not helped by a dream sequence which doesn’t seem to add much except make me want to watch The Shining. I also thought the opening was strange. This is going to seem very picky but I can’t ignore it. It opens with a shot of a theatre sign, pans down and we see someone. But because the focus is on the person, the background is out of focus. This would be fine but it means that the opening is a blurry shot of a sign, just seems a bit weird that they wouldn’t have that in focus and then just change it as they panned down. Picky I know, but it bugged me, especially the second time I saw it. But the fact I’ve seen this twice says enough about how highly I regard this film. A great watch, and a much better Whohasdonethis than the rather lackluster Death On The Nile. Does make me think that I really need to watch The Mousetrap though.

Three Thousand Years Of Longing (2022)

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Alithea (Tilda Swinton) is a scholar who specialises in mythology. Whilst in Instanbul she purchases a bottle and accidentally unleashes a Djinn (Idris Elba) who offers her three wishes. Given her knowledge of this subject, she’s aware of the pitfalls and is unsure whether to wish. The Djinn tries to assuage her worries by telling her three stories of his past.

George Miller is quite strangely wonderful, isn’t he? He’s made some huge movies, but still has the passion and weirdness of a hungry young director. He never feels like he’s phoning it in, whether he’s doing Babe: Pig In The City, Happy Feet, Mad Max: Fury Road, or Witches Of Eastwick. This is an adaptation of a short story (The Djinn In The Nightingale’s Eye), and somehow stretched it out to 110 minutes. Under most directors, this would be a recipe for disaster, but Miller kind of makes it work.

In terms of visual style, this is much closer to Fury Road than it is to anything else he’s done: it’s psychedelic and hauntingly beautiful in a way that entrances you as you watch it. If it turned out this film was actually just a way to hypnotise you into, I dunno, buying more yo-yos or something, you wouldn’t be surprised. It’s all so colourful and wonderful, accompanied by eerie strange music that compliments it perfectly.

I never knew I wanted Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba together in a film, but it makes a lot of sense. They bounce well off each other, and the chemistry they have is electric and I’d love to see them work together again. They’d make a good romantic couple in a film.

We know this because of the film’s weird third act. Most of the film consists of the Djinn telling stories about his past, and those parts are full of magic and wonder. After hearing those stories, for some reason Alithea decides that she wants her wish to be for him to be in love with her. It’s really weird and comes out of nowhere, especially since she’s only known him for a few hours. They then move in together and complications ensue, involving a small sub-plot with racist neighbours that is introduced and ended within a few minutes. The rest of the film is so good but the final third severely lets it down. It feels very disconnected from the rest of the movie, and feels like it has come from a very rushed script. It’s a real shame, as it means you leave the cinema not with a feeling of amazement, but with a sense of disappointment and frustration.

So, maybe see this, but paying full price almost guarantees you’d feel you have wasted your money.

Mr. Malcolm’s List (2022)

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Quick Synopsis: Julia (Zawe Ashton) gets rejected by Mr. Malcolm (Sope Dirisu) and finds out he judges his potential suitors on if they match up to a list he has of the qualities his ideal wife would have. She gets revenge on him by getting her friend Selina (Freida Pinto) to pretend to be the perfect woman for him.

I’m not usually a fan of period dramas. The stakes are normally too unimportant for me to really give a shit. They’re usually just a group of privileged people in fancy houses, worrying because war has broken out and that has the potential to ruin their dinner party.

This is better than most purely because the characters actually acknowledge that they’re spoiled and that their problems are ones that most people won’t bother with. Also, a lot of the characters aren’t white. It’s a small detail that was caused by colour-blind casting. I won’t say it makes the film a lot better, but it does make it stand out. There’s some controversy over the casting, but only from racist assholes, so not from actual people. From people who know good performances when they see them the casting is appreciated. Zawe Ashton has been getting a lot of the attention from critics, and I can see why as she is good. But I feel Freida Pinto is the real star. Sope Dirisu plays the title character perfectly and deserves to be mentioned. A lot of his character work is done off-screen, it’s descriptions from other people about him. So he has to match those descriptions when we do see him, he’s been bigger up so much by people that if he doesn’t live up to expectations in terms of performance, if he doesn’t have that “it” factor, then the film will fall apart, audiences would automatically zone out.

This is the directorial debut feature from Emma Holly Jones, because if you’re making your first film, make it a period comedy, and film it during COVID, just to make it as difficult for yourself as possible. She has previously directed a short film version of this, so it makes sense that she’d do a good job here, especially since she has carried most of the cast over. She gives the film a really good look. It doesn’t look too extravagant, but there is definitely a rich elegance to the whole thing. The characters definitely have wealth, but they don’t look like they’re at the level of rich where it’s almost parody.

The story? It’s standard. It’s a film that’s difficult to spoil because the plot doesn’t matter. Just from watching the trailer you know what’s going to happen. She’s going to pretend to be into him but then actually fall for him, the friend who set the plan up is going to get annoyed and tell him the truth, he’s going to be annoyed but then they end up together. You won’t be too surprised to find out that that is what happens. But that’s not the important thing, you don’t watch this for the story being told, you watch it to see how they tell it. And they tell it well, the characters are likeable, the jokes are funny, and it feels like every actor has decided to add a really subtle physical quirk to make their characters seem like real people. The dialogue is really funny, and means that even though it is set in a universe that you can’t hope to visit, you still relate and are invested. It is a bit silly, but it knows it. There’s a great moment where Mr. Malcolm defends the list, and you feel his exasperation and confusion that he is somehow a villain for daring to actually like the women he plans to spend the rest of his life with. Shocking, I know. It’s an obvious point, and it’s good that the characters actually acknowledge and discuss it instead of just ignoring it like many other similar films do.

So in summary, you don’t NEED to see this, but it is fun, and I do recommend it.