Tag: film review

Finding Your Feet (2018)

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There has a been a small rise in films aimed at the “grey pound” in the last few years, and they’re normally pretty damn good (Exotic Marigold Hotel, for example, was delightful), but they never change the world. I mean, the scripts are nearly always great, but they won’t be your favourite films. On the one hand, it’s nice to see films which aren’t aimed at the 18-25 male demographic where they spend millions on special effects but piece the script together using random words cut from cereal boxes. But I do fear this could lead to “old people” being a genre, so there is the possibility that it could actually pigeonhole an entire generation, so the only films starring people over the age of 50 will be these kinds of films. There is also the risk that as they become more popular, the scripts become less refined, and you have the danger of them just becoming “old people are people too” and being really condescending. It’s one of the great things about this film actually, they’re not written as old people, they’re written as people who have lived a while. There is a difference: if you write a character as elderly, you give them only elderly characteristics, if you write them as someone who has lived, you give them entire backstories full of drunken escapades in their youth. There is a tendency to write characters entirely based on who they are now, and forget how they must have been to lead to this point, and this film should be commended for doing that. It’s a masterclass of character-work, even the way the sets are designed. Celia Imrie’s character has a flat which has so much detail to it it’s almost a character itself.

This is not the greatest film I’ve seen, but it’s enjoyable. It’s the cinematic equivalent of a piece of toast (I compare films to food way more than most people do, I should look into that). By that, I mean that no matter how perfectly it does what it needs to, it will never be your favourite. It sticks to a formula, and as such is kind of restrained by that. You can guess almost every single plot point in this film from the opening 10 minutes. It won’t surprise you at all. But it doesn’t really need to, this is not a film to analyse and pore over, it’s a film to sit and distract yourself, and it does that well. The dialogue is razor sharp, the characters are loveable (and fully fleshed out, even the background ones have minor details to them which help you know them), and it will make you smile. The whole thing is just massively endearing and charming and, I don’t know, warm I guess is the word I’m looking for. You know how certain films have colours attached to them? I’d say this one is orangey red. It’s just comforting and lovely, the kind of film the whole family gathers and watches on Christmas Day, in that post-dinner haze where you’re all too exhausted to move, and someone inevitably falls asleep in the sofa with their Christmas hat still on. It’s incredibly BBC, and I mean that as positive and a negative.

So yeah don’t go out of your way to watch this, but if (actually, when) it comes on iPlayer, watch it immediately. You won’t regret it, plus, you get to see Celia Imrie and Timothy Spall get high, and you won’t get that in Avengers (if that turns out to be wrong, I’ll be amazed).

The Shape Of Water (2017)

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Don’t watch this film! I mean it, do not watch this film. It’s one of those films that’s actually impossible to sit down and watch. You do not watch this, you absorb it. You sit back and let it take over every single ounce of your being. You sit there and marvel at the beauty you see before you, this is cinema as art, and is one of the most awe-inspiring things you’ll see all year. Guillermo Del Toro should now be given free reign to make whatever film he wants. Actually, I’d love to see him do an episode of Doctor Who or Black Mirror. Every shot looks like a watercolour painting, full of the majesty of colours and wonder. The music too is superb, you won’t leave the cinema humming the melodies or anything, but it enhances every single scene it’s in, it really compliments the images to the point where it almost seems like the scenes were made to match up with the music, as opposed to the scene coming first and music being decided later.

It’s not just behind the scenes though, the people in front of camera help make this brilliant. Sally Hawkins and Doug Jones deserve every accolade thrown their way. They’re mute characters who have to lead the film, that’s not easy. It could be argued that it’s slightly easier for Sally Hawkins as she at least gets sign language to utilise, but that’s like saying it’s easier to run a marathon with one leg than no legs. It still takes remarkable skill from her. Ordinarily this would be the best performance I see all year, but unfortunately for her, Three Billboards also exists. It’s a shame that both existed in the same year as it meant one had to lose out on deserved awards. Doug Jones is also pretty darn great in this, doing sooooo much with body language that you kind of don’t realise he’s not speaking, he doesn’t need to.

The supporting cast also pulls their weight, obviously since Richard Jenkins got nominated for best supporting actor. Michael Shannon also deserves praise. His character is utterly reprehensible, partly due to the writing, but also due to how he plays it. He completely loses himself in the character, holding absolutely nothing back.

My main issue with this film? It’s really hard to criticise. It’s all so beautiful, everyone is so great, and the story is so heart-warming and emotional, it ties all the loose ends up but also leaves room for different interpretations and questions about the characters. That’s why this review has been so hard to write, it’s difficult to make “this film is amazing!” into a compelling piece of writing. That’s my opinion though, others think differently. Not many others though, mainly Rex Reed from the New York Observer. Who wrote (and I won’t link to it, I don’t want to increase his views):

“This horror film masquerading as a fairy tale is about a mute woman who cleans toilets, scrubs floors and falls in love with a monster from beneath the sea. The pathetic girl is played by the wonderful British actress Sally Hawkins, who specializes in defective creatures herself.”

A few points: 1) it’s not a horror film. At all, it’s a fantasy film. It may use a few horror tropes and conventions, but it’s still at its heart a fantasy film, albeit one aimed at adults.

2) “pathetic girl”. Fuck you. Fuck you in the ear. She’s not pathetic, and if you think that then I worry for you.

3) “defective creatures”. Ok, this is just a horribly offensive comment. Just because someone is mute does not make them a defective creature you ableist asswipe.

The review only goes downhill from there, referring to Get Out as “overrated piece of junk” and getting the director’s name wrong. Look, I know Benicio Del Toro is a good actor, but he’s not a director. Yes, they have similar names, but you can’t call yourself a film reviewer if you can’t distinguish between the two. It would be like getting Billie Joe Armstrong and Billie Jean King confused. I find negative reviews fascinating when they’ve clearly not actually watched the film. The best example of this was Toy Story 3 where the reviewer seemed to only watch the opening 5 minutes, getting the villain wrong, the story wrong, and his final mark wrong. Don’t be like that guy, don’t be wrong. Buy a ticket to Shape Of Water and revel in its greatness, you’ll thank me.

Black Panther (2018)

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Different films inspire different reactions (shocking, I know). That instant gut feeling you have no conscious control over, that just enters your head when you leave a film. Sometimes it’s “that was good”, sometimes it’s “that ending was a real letdown”, my reaction to this can be summed up in just one word:

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Finally! FINALLY, we get a black lead in a mainstream comic book movie of extremely high quality. FINALLY, Marvel has a “personal connection to the hero” villain that really works (and isn’t Loki). FINALLY, a Marvel movie has a great soundtrack, as opposed to a great compilation album. Similar to Wonder Woman last year, this film NEEDED to succeed, and it needed to do so unquestionably. If this was anything less than a massive success then it would have been deemed a failure, and people would have said “well this just proves no films should ever have a black lead”. Thankfully it’s a massive hit, unarguably so.

There’s a reason this film has been a hit: it’s really really good. The script is sound, the characters are all fully formed, there’s none of that “but that character is just a stereotype”, even the minor characters have arcs and motivations. The villain, in particular, is superb. Fantastically written, and blessed with one of the best performances of the year so far (and considering that this is when the “Oscar movies” are released in UK that says a lot). His motivations make sense, you can see why he’s doing what he does. Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis also do well in their roles of Tolkein White Guys.

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With Moonlight, Get Out, and now this, there seems to be a real renaissance for mainstream, critically acclaimed black cinema. I usually dislike that term as it tends to just mean “films where the main character is black”. These films are different though, they explore concepts and issues which are specifically black, they’re films where if the main characters weren’t black the stories would be completely different. It helps that this has been brilliantly researched. There are countless nods to African culture throughout, some obvious (the clothing and jewellery), some really subtle (the hair). Yup, even the hair tells a f*cking story in this, EVERYTHING has been meticulously planned and executed.

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I wasn’t joking about the hair

One disappointment is that it doesn’t really continue the overall MCU story arc they have going on. If this film came out earlier this wouldn’t be an issue at all, but this is the final film before Infinity War. Actually, they’ve completely screwed up the order of this phase. It should have been:

  1. Civil War
  2. Guardians Of The Galaxy
  3. Black Panther
  4. Doctor Strange
  5. Spider-Man: Homecoming
  6. Thor: Ragnarok

This way it slowly sets up the background arc of Thanos gradually becoming a threat, then you have the comedic calm of Spider-Man working as a breather before the chaotic storm of Infinity War. It also introduces the idea of magic later on, which cuts out a lot of “why doesn’t this guy help?”. Also, Guardians would make a great contrast if it came after Civil War. You’d have the story of a team falling apart, and then one about a team gradually getting bigger. This also meant that the fact the soul stone wasn’t in Black Panther isn’t as disappointing to audiences as it is at the moment. It also means the ending of Thor has an actual “holy shit, things are going to get serious really quickly”. As opposed to now, where it’s “holy shit, things are going to get serious in the film after the next one”. See, this film was so good one of the only things I can criticise is the running order of the series. It’s like criticising an album by saying the songs should have been in a different order. Go see this film, then buy it when it comes out.

Darkest Hour (2017)

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I should preface this review by pointing out that no matter what I say in this, never let it be said that I didn’t think this film was impressive. The cinematography was superb, the way the shots were composed was a thing of beauty. The acting was magnificent and hard to fault. But the downsides. Over the last few years I’ve noticed I get emotional very easily during films when I watch them at the cinema. It truly doesn’t take much to bring tears to my eyes during films lately. I felt nothing during this movie. Absolutely nothing. There was not a single genuinely emotive sequence during it. There were moments which had emotive performances, and emotive music, but I never really felt anything whilst watching them. It was all too sterile. It was like an aliens idea of what human emotion would be. There is one exception. There’s a scene near the end where Churchill takes a tube train to Westminster and starts talking to the general public. This scene is emotive. You get to see panic, fear, and hope. As a piece of screenwriting, it’s great, and as a character piece, it’s superb. It’s also bullshit. There’s no evidence that it happened, at all. So in a story set during a period of time where you couldn’t throw a dart out of a zeppelin without hitting an emotive story, this film has to invent something to get an emotive response. There are countless other historical inaccuracies. Some you’d have to be a bit weird to get annoyed about “the trains don’t look exactly the same”, to some which just seem a bit cruel. For example, it paints Neville Chamberlain and Halifax (the person, not the bank) as scheming villains who did their best to destroy Churchill, which is something neither of them even attempted. I have a huge problem with this kind of thing. Because, like it or not, people will be taking lessons from this. Doesn’t matter how many times the writers or directors say “this is mostly embellished”, people will still believe it. For evidence of this look at the damage that Robin Hood has done to King John. This isn’t a fictional character you’re saying these things about, these are real people with actual ancestors still alive today, ancestors who would like to take pride in the actions of their descendants but are unable to because of BS like this. Did you really need to give a real character a villain upgrade just for your film to work? If that’s the case, then your film has a broken concept and doesn’t work. Plus, it’s not as though World War 2 was lacking in villainous characters, you didn’t need to invent one. There’s some stuff which is a bit weirder than that in terms of historical accuracy, one of the main characters wasn’t even in the country at the time of the events. It would be like if you were watching a show about 9/11 and one of the main characters was Justin Bieber.

I know this sounds like a negative review and that that I disliked it. That would be wrong, I did like it. I just didn’t really love it, and everything positive has already been said, and by people much smarter and more eloquent than I am. So going over them again would be a bit pointless.

The Mercy (2018)

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In a few reviews of films based on true stories, I have mentioned that I can find it hard to be fully engrossed in them when I know how the stories end. I’ve also mentioned before how it really annoys me when films put so much of the story in the trailer that the entire film is playing catch up to the trailer when you watch it. Who’d have thought I’d finally see a film that combines both? Lucky me!

I’m not underestimating that by the way, if you watch the trailer then you’ve seen the film. I mean, sure you miss the final five minutes (possibly less), but other than that the trailer is basically a condensed version of the film. I kept waiting to see something new, to see a plot point that propelled the final third of the film into an area I didn’t expect, but nope, just same old, same old.

I think this films biggest problem is it’s a bit too Colin Firth-ey, not Tom Hardy-ey enough. Colin First is a great actor, this cannot be denied, but a lot of films he is in, they tend to be kind of twee and lovely. Tom Hardy, however, chooses film roles in films that could break your spirit. That’s what this film needed. It needed darkness, it needed to stop focusing on beautiful scenery (and it is beautiful, don’t get me wrong) and focus more on inner turmoil. It also needed to stop CUTTING AWAY FROM THE MAIN CHARACTER. I mean, seriously, the film is about a man hopelessly lost and completely isolated from those he loves. The most effective way to do this would be to keep him as the main focus, you focus so much on his on this small boat that you begin to feel trapped with him. You begin to miss the other characters just as much as he does, you feel his loss. This film doesn’t give you an opportunity to do that, it continually cuts back and forth between him and his family, in both the present and the past. I get why they did that, it’s showing what he’s missing and has left behind, I just REALLY don’t agree with it. If they didn’t show that nobody would think “yeah, it’s just his family though, why’s he so bothered about that?”. It’s his family so the initial assumption is that he loves them very much, we don’t need to see it and the fact we do hurts the flow of the film and means we never really get to feel trapped with him, because narratively we’re not.

There’s a great story told somewhere within this film, I just felt the director was the wrong choice. I’m not saying James Marsh is a bad director, but not every story is suitable for some directors, you wouldn’t expect Tim Burton to do a historical drama, if Michael Bay was doing the new Saw it would be a mess. Marsh’s style is focused on beauty, this film needed to be uglier to work, then it could have been truly spectacular.

Early Man (2018)

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I remember reading a video game magazine back in the 90’s and they were comparing two games. Both of them involved Russian writing in buildings, one of them (probably Goldeneye) used grammatically correct Russian that translated well, whereas the other one (Probably Mission Impossible) just used random Russian-looking letters and hoped nobody would notice. They’re kind of right, most people would not notice, but the fact they used that as an excuse to not try saddens me. I prefer the first example, for all they knew, 99% of people wouldn’t notice, but that 1% would, and they did it for them. The thing is, even if that 1% did notice, most of them wouldn’t care anyway, they’d just be like “ah well” and move on. I love when companies do things like that though, when they actually put effort into their work. It’s why I love Aardman. Every single frame is full of joy and wonder. Visual jokes are almost hidden in the background. You have to pay attention to almost everything in every scene, constantly paying attention so you don’t miss a joke or shout out. It’s not the kind of thing you do for money, it’s the kind of thing you do just for the hell of it. They’ve done it throughout their career, most obviously in the Wallace And Gromit series where it usually takes at least five viewings to spot all the jokes.

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This bit did make me cry

So we’ve established I found this film funny, what else? The plot was……erm, well it’s suitable for a kids film. It does have tremendous plot/joke integration though. There are jokes in this which will only work in this film, if you change the story or the setting, they would fail quicker than Milli Vanilli after the MTV performance (very niche reference I know, but f*ck it, I’m making it). But you don’t really watch this for the plot, if you are then it’s definitely the wrong film for you. The vocal performances are pretty good but nothing you’ll be too impressed by. The accents of a lot of the characters seem like something that comes from a vaguely racist 70’s British sitcom (i.e. any 70’s British sitcom), Timothy Spall is the best of the bunch though. One thing did surprise me; they had Maisie Williams doing a French accent. She’s huge at the moment so why not cast her as someone else and have her do her natural voice? Then you can, I don’t know, get an actual French person do to the French accent. This is just more confusing by the fact that involved in the distribution of the film was StudioCanal, a French company. Isn’t it in their interests to promote French actors? I don’t think people were seeing this because Maisie Williams, so adjusting her vocal role wouldn’t have negatively affected the film that much. Side note; judging by the trailers you can expect me to talk about this kind of thing more when Red Sparrow comes out.

Finally, the look of this film. As I implied earlier, this film looks absolutely superb. You could take almost any scene from this and use it as a potential poster. It doesn’t look quite as great as Coco, but it does look slightly crisper. It looks more real (that is one of the advantages of the animation technique they use, it may not flow as well but there’s no distinction between background and foreground so everything looks important).

So should you see this? I wouldn’t say you need to own this on DVD or anything, but if it gets put on iPlayer or netflix then you need to watch it immediately, so basically it’s like Cool Runnings, only with less John Candy.

Father Figures (2018)

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This is one of the first films this year where I knew absolutely nothing going in. Didn’t know who was in it, what it was about, didn’t even really know the title. After watching it, it turns out there’s a reason for that. It’s quite dull. Nothing about it really works, the performances are flat, the characters are badly written to the point where they’re basically just really annoying and easy to dislike, and the story takes too long to go nowhere. I mean, it’s technically a film, but only in the same way that a Pot Noodle is technically food. I mean, it has moving images which are projected, and there is recorded sound that goes along with it, and you watch it in a cinema. But in terms of emotion and storytelling, it’s lacking. You know what it reminds me of? There was a period in the 70’s where it seemed like every British sitcom (Porridge, On The Buses, Steptoe and Son etc) got a movie. Normally they’d contain sub-par writing and they’d just use an increased budget to do an episode with lots of exterior shots. The stories would basically be fluff and it would be hard to imagine it being somebody’s dream to tell that story. That’s this film. It also features an inexplicable cameo by someone who won’t be known by anybody outside of the one country the film is set. I mean, who is Terry Bradshaw? I’ve read his Wikipedia page and I’m still not entirely sure. It doesn’t help that they have him playing himself, then have Ving Rhames playing a fictional team-mate of his. For someone who knows nothing about American Football (from what I can tell it’s about them trying to put an egg in a really impressive Super Bowl, presumably to make an omelette later on) this is quite weird and takes you out of the movie.

Now, back to the performances. Ed Helms seems like he’s playing a character that was written for Ben Stiller that he turned down. He’s hinted at having anger issues but this isn’t really explored besides people saying “hey, remember your anger issues, stop being angry”. Christopher Walken seemed to be sleepwalking through his performance,  and similar accusations could be levied at Owen Wilson. There are two exceptions to this: Glenn Close has one scene in particular where you’re reminded of just how truly great an actress she is, and Katie Aselton is the highlight of the film by far. It’s not just her performance (although that is great, she plays her character perfectly), it’s the way her character is written too. There’s a five-ten minute scene of her and Ed Helms characters interacting drunkenly, and it’s full of warmth, emotion, and laughs. All of which are missing from the rest of the film. This is probably one of the only times I can think where a romance subplot in a movie saved it. It was the only period in the film where I was completely invested in the characters in front of me. Shame it didn’t last.

I could lie and say this movie had potential, but I can’t bring myself to do it. Outside of that one scene, there was nothing I really enjoyed about this. I suppose this is why it wasn’t advertised, and also why the release date changed from November 2016 to January 2017, and then changed again the same month as the intended release. Apparently, it’s the sixth worst opening of all-time for a film released in over 2,500 theatres. Never like to see something like that, and it makes me sad that it happened, but I cannot really defend this film. I can’t even really say it tried, as it’s so cliche and unoriginal that I don’t even think it did that. About thirty minutes into this film this couple sitting near me received a phone call saying their child had been injured at school and needed picking up, they were the lucky ones.

Winchester (2018)

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Imagine going to see a magician. You sit in the crowd watching, wondering whether he’ll be any good. She (for the purposes of this hypothetical it’s a female magician) comes on stage and for her first trick pulls a lion out of a hat. Wow, pretty impressive. Then for her next trick, she turns a bouquet of flowers into a Ford Fiesta, again you’re impressed. She then produces a hat, you’re excited to see what she’ll do, you anxiously await to see what will happen. Drum roll, lights dim, and she slowly reaches into the hat and pulls out……a lion. I mean, that’s still impressive, but less so than it was before.  But then she gets another bouquet of flowers out. You fear the worst, and she does the worst, transforming them again into a Ford Fiesta. She repeats those two tricks for the entire night. Now, no matter how impressive those tricks were the first time you saw them, would you still consider that a good show? No, you’d consider it a waste of time and ask for your money back. That, pretty much, is what watching this film is like. It runs out of steam after the opening scares, which, by the way, aren’t needed. You can cut the entire opening and it wouldn’t affect the film at all. Actually, it might improve it as it would save some of the creepy visuals for later.

I really wish this film was better. It has a great concept, someone has acquired vast sums of wealth but feel guilty by the deaths caused by it, so seeks to make amends to those who have died. That would be a great character-driven drama to have. It also wastes the location. It’s set in a house that’s constantly changing and with no real floor plan. That’s PERFECT for a horror film. A house that’s a maze, trapping people in there making you wonder if the house is genuinely set up like that or if the characters are losing their minds. Actually, that would be a great survival horror video game; you’re locked in an ever-changing house and need to escape before you starve to death and the longer you last the harder it gets as you start to suffer hallucinations.

And now back to the film. It has its good points. There’s a scene near the end where a room full of guns suddenly rise and point themselves at the main character, it’s a beautifully composed shot in an otherwise visually-lacking film. The story has potential but never really fully lives up to what you think it can do. The performances are……..okay. Helen Mirren deserves better than this. Jason Clarke continues to be a dependable “where do I know that guy from? Oh right, ALMOST EVERYTHING” guy. His performances are usually pretty good, but every single one makes it seem like he’s the guy they get in to replace the actor when a successful film franchise goes straight to DVD. I’ve never really found much to fault with his performances, but I’ve also never been overly impressed, he’s just been there, like the casting equivalent of white bread.

I think that’s the best way to describe this film actually; bland. When I come to the end of year list this will be really hard to write about and place as I don’t think I’m going to be able to remember much about it, in fact, if I didn’t keep a list I’m not sure I’d even remember I saw it. Helen Mirren deserves better, the story deserves better, and the audience deserves better. It kind of feels like a modern remake of a far superior film.

Downsizing (2017)

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I wish this was better. I wouldn’t say I had high hopes, but I had medium hopes. I expected it to be average, and it couldn’t even manage that. The trailer intrigued me and when I saw mediocre reviews I assumed them to be wrong, kind of like Surburbicon last year. But throughout the film, I just felt that whenever the story was faced with multiple options it always picked the most boring one, kind of like Surburbicon. Multiple interesting side stories were swept to the side just to continue the story of Matt Damon, just like, well you get the idea.

Ironically, considering the subject matter, this film really needed to be cut down. It’s over two hours long and you feel every single second. I’d estimate the first hour or so can be cut down into about ten minutes. We don’t need the complete history of the scientific process involved. We also don’t need him to have a dying mother (who dies off screen after one scene and is NEVER mentioned again). You don’t need them going house-hunting or to a sales pitch for the process. You just need to set up that he’s bored as hell and is looking to change his life. Speaking of characters who just disappear (which I was, like a few minutes ago, not just now, but relatively recently), his wife. With the exception of her divorce leaving him with no money, her deciding to not get shrunk has almost no impact on the story and shows another missed opportunity. The film occasionally shows how people who haven’t got the procedure are acting slightly hostile towards those that do, saying they shouldn’t be able to vote as they’re not proper people etc. It does this for the opening, then again, never does it again. They could have had that play into the divorce settlement, have it so the court finds her more important because she’s an actual person and he’s not. But nope, they just show it as him signing a form and then he’s poor.

It isn’t completely without merit though. Hong Chau is amazing. Her performance is utterly heartbreaking. Actually, if the film was focused on her character from the start it would be A LOT better. She plays a Vietnamese activist who was shrunk against her will by the government and tried to escape to the US. But everybody she travelled with died and she lost her leg, leaving her in a lot of pain and having to work a menial job just to survive whilst essentially looking after an entire apartment complex of people; bringing them food etc so they can survive. She then meets a guy who can help her and they fall in love. It’s a very sweet story, but we see the dullest half of it. Think about it, her story contains a lot of political and social satire about the way the western world goes after other countries for the way it treats people, and then exploits those same people. It has basically everything you want from a story, so why wasn’t that one made?

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Depressingly I can guess the reason

Christoph Waltz seems to be having a lot of fun too, but then again he seems like that in most films. Every film I’ve seen him in he looks like he’s just having a blast making it, even when the film is terrible. Udo Keir, too, plays his role wonderfully, all the while looking like a mid-table Premier League manager who’s about to spend £40million on Andy Carroll.

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So in summary; as much as I don’t want to say this I would not recommend this film. Possibly the film I’ve enjoyed least at the cinema so far this year. The one highlight is Hong Chau’s performance, nothing else in the film makes it worth watching.

End Of 2017 Film Awards

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Our final look back at 2017, after this it’s onwards and upwards as we look forward to the wonders of 2018 (by which I mean, Coco, Ghost Stories, and Three Billboards, two of which I’ve already seen, so really the year is all downhill from here)

Best Actor

Winner

Daniel Kaluuya – Get Out

The entire film sinks or swims on his performance. If he doesn’t give a good performance then this entire film sinks. The writing, the directing, it’s all for nothing if you don’t buy the central performance. Fortunately, he’s superb. Not just vocally, visually he just owns this performance. Starting off seeming really cocky and arrogant, then ending up terrified. If this doesn’t lead to him leading more films then I officially give up on Hollywood.

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I know, the film that had this in the trailer ended up being creepy, who’d have guessed?

Other Nominees

Jason Sudeikis. – Colossal

Genuinely creepy and unsettling. Brilliant. I expected his performance to be comedic and one-note but he managed to turn in a magnificent performance that made him seem like the creepiest person on the planet, but believable. You could see his thought processes in play and knew why he was thinking like that. The revelation about his creepy persona makes sense because of how well it’s been set up. A sign of not only a great performance, but also great writing.

Hugh Jackman – Logan

This is a personal choice, because I didn’t think he could do as much as he did in this. The way he carries the character contains a lot of backstory. He’s no longer the invincible hero, he’s playing him as someone who knows his time is up. Someone who knows he’s not long for this world and is struggling to face his own mortality. It’s a depressing performance for a comic book film, but works wonderfully.

Best Actress

Winner

McKenna Grace – Gifted

Want to know how good this performance was? It was a performance by a child actor that I didn’t hate. The character is a know-it-all smartass. So it would be incredibly easy for her character to come off as annoying and pretentious. The way McKenna plays her, however, is great. She’s played as someone who knows the downside of her intelligence, someone who knows that whilst she is much smarter than her uncle/caregiver, that doesn’t necessarily mean she knows more than him. It’s played with a slight vulnerability to her which renders her incredibly easy to root for and support. No idea where she, as an actress goes from here but I’m intrigued.

mckenna_grace_and_chris_evans_in_gifted
And she had great chemistry with Chris Evans

Other Nominees

Anne Hathaway – Colossal

I do love Anne Hathaway. She’s most known for romantic comedies sadly but has a phenomenal range. For proof of this watch Rachel Getting Married, she gives an amazing performance as a recovering addict haunted by her past choices. She’s just as good in this. Some of that is obviously down to the script, but a lot of it is down to the performance. She plays someone who is broken incredibly well, I’d like to see her as a psychopathic killer in a film.

Mandy Moore – 47 Meters Down

Yes, THAT Mandy Moore. What do you mean, who’s that and what’s that song? Do you people have no respect for late 90’s pop? Damn kids, get off my lawn! Anyway, in this, she was very, very, good. So good that I forgot I was watching a former pop star and just got heavily invested in the story. I kind of forgot I was an actress and felt I was watching actual people. That’s not the easiest thing to do.

Worst Film

Winner

Wish Upon

Very bad, but all the worst because it had a good concept. If a film is just bad, that’s okay, if a film is bad but has the potential to be good, I find that a lot harder to forgive. Even the good parts of the film seem to have come from other, better films.

Other Nominees

Sleepless

Dull, dull, dull. So boring. I’ve suffered from insomnia for years and this film almost put me to sleep. It almost feels like it would take effort to make an action film this dull, so in some ways, it’s actually quite impressive.

The Belko experiment

It runs out of ideas before the trailer has even finished. Would be a great short, but as a feature-length film, it’s an abomination.

The Dark Tower

“surely this isn’t as bad as everybody says?” It is. It really is. And serves as more proof that Idris Elba really needs to fire his agent.

Best Film Moment

Winner

Atomic Blonde: The Stairwell Fight

I am a sucker for a good really long shot. Especially in action sequences. I love nothing better than a fight scene where you can almost feel the impact of every hit, where’s there no cutaway before every impact. If one of those goes on for a minute I’m in heaven. I know that doesn’t seem long, but sit back and time that out, and picture a fight scene with no cuts lasting that long. Bit difficult isn’t it? This was NEARLY 10 MINUTES! Now this isn’t actually, one shot, it’s just edited like that, but it’s still a really impressive feat and is visually magnificent. The seemingly unedited nature of it means when the character hits someone, you really feel it. It feels like a fight, rather than a fight scene. It’s actually really great character work too. It means you don’t view Charlize Theron’s character as some kind of invincible hero, you view her as a human who is potentially one mistake away from being severely injured.

Other Nominees

Wonder Woman: No Mans Land

No Mans Land. If you want to explain Wonder Woman as a character, and as a feminist icon, show this scene. Without a doubt the best moment in the DC cinematic universe, by a long shot. This film may have been underappreciated when it comes to the oscars (which is something I don’t agree with, but I get why), but this scene is something that I feel deserves to be seen by everybody.

Spiderman Homecoming: The Car Scene

You know the one, where Michael Keaton’s character is taking Peter Parker to the school dance and slowly comes to the realisation of who he is. Marvel films have had great action set pieces in films lately, but this is a great character piece. It’s a testament to both the script and the performances that what could have been dull turned into one of the tensest scenes of the year.

A Monster Calls: The Stories

This was a great film, super depressing and wonderful. But there were moments throughout the film where it became magnificent. Whilst the Liam Neeson tree was telling stories (it’s an odd film) the art style switches from a normal live-action film to something which can be best described as a living water-colour painting. The images flow through each other like they’re made of water showing off a multitude of colours leaving the viewer gobsmacked at the pure unrelenting beauty of the whole thing. This is the one out of the three that you might not have seen, so here’s the scene in question:

Best Film

Winner

Get Out

Not just a good film, a very very important one too. This is like the fourth time I’ve had to talk about how much I love this film in these end of year blogs. It’s had almost everything you need. Great story, great actors, great script, great directing, not too many cliches. This film will be spoken about for years to come, and hopefully, lead to a resurgence in socio-political horror.

Other nominees

Logan

More than just a superhero film, a great western tale about morality and mortality, with a great performance by Dafne Keen too.

IT

Yes, Get Out is a better horror film. But this was more than that. This was a great coming of age film. Genuinely heartwarming with characters it’s impossible to not to love.

The Big Sick

I’m a sucker for romcoms, and I’m a sucker for depressing bleak films. Who’d have thought they’d be a film that can combine both? Made all the better for the fact it’s based on a true story. Also the winner of the “Most surprising cameo by a cast member of Crazy Ex Girlfriend” award, which doesn’t exist as an award, but if it did, this would win it, and Downsizing would win the award for 2018, and nothing else because it was dull.

The “Well I Liked It” Award

Winner

Murder On The Orient Express (Rotten Tomato Score: 57%)

The visuals alone should have merited a higher score for this. I think part of the dislike for this is just because it’s a remake. Every single remake has had people bitch that it’s different from the original (I bet back in the day people were complaining that DeNiro in Cape Fear wasn’t as good as Robert Mitchum in the original). Yes, the glut of remakes is a problem. Actually, no, strike that, the glut of lazy remakes is a problem. You can remake anything you want as long as you put the effort in. I would much rather watch a remake made with love than an original idea made “just because”.

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Nominees

Table 19 (Rotten Tomato Score: 26%)

I’d accept a low 50 score for this, but 26 is far far too low. Incredibly funny, great performances and a magnificent script. I’m a sucker for great dialogue, which this had in spades.

The Last Word (Rotten Tomato Score: 37%)

Do people just not appreciate dialogue any more? Yes, the story was cliche at times, but the way it told it was magnificent. Also it should be commended for promising something dark, and then delivering on it rather than just going for the happily ever after ending.

Best Film To Look At

Winner

Blade Runner 2049

Because LOOK AT IT!

https-blueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.comuploadscardimage544323446eb31c-fe20-47df-8552-01dd10cd480dDo I actually need to say anything else? It looks so gorgeous I almost made an audible response so many times. Almost every shot could be used as a poster.

Also nominated. 

Kong

Mainly because it proved that spectacle cinema can still work in this day and age. I’m a cynical person so assumed it would have no impression on me. Yet I was amazed when I watched it. Was sucked into the universe completely.