Tag: Review

Licorice Pizza (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick synopsis: A coming-of-age comedy-drama about a romance between a 15-year-old boy and a 25-year-old woman.

I can sense this is one a lot of people will read and disagree with me about. I just never got past the general concept. It just doesn’t sit right with me. The film ends with them getting back together and it making them happy. It’s presented as a good thing. The whole thing would have been improved if there was even a hint of uncertainty about the whole thing. I don’t like stealing endings from other films, but if they just redid the ending of The Graduate it would have improved it a lot. Add some uncertainty, make it clear to the audience that these people are making terrible choices. I’m not sure why they’re those ages either. Her character is so immature and he is starting businesses all the time so nothing would have been lost if you cut the difference and made them both 20.

It might have been easier for me to enjoy it if the two leads were likeable. They’re not, at least not when they’re with each other. They bring out the worst in each others characters, it makes Cooper Hoffmans character (Gary) seem more of an insecure incel-like asshole, and it makes Alana Haim’s character (Alana) seem more petty and stubborn. The two are never less likeable than when they’re with each other. There’s a moment where he tries to get her an acting gig, telling her “if they ask if you can do anything, say yes, always say yes if they ask anything”. They ask her if she would be comfortable doing nude scenes, she says yes. He’s annoyed. He explains later “oh, so you won’t show me your boobs but you’ll show the whole world?”. It just shows that he’s not mature enough for this kind of relationship, which is to be expected because, you know, he’s 15. But her reaction, of leaving, then coming back and flashing him, means he wins. His insecure way of dealing with things got him what he wanted. It would be like if a film showed the main character sulking because the restaurant wouldn’t give them a free meal, and then the restaurant acquiesces. Nobody learns a lesson, and everybody seems a little bit less likeable.

There are also moments where she’s needlessly needling him, just verbally poking him and exploring his biggest flaws just to annoy him. This isn’t cute, it doesn’t make her fun or playful, it makes her seem really manipulative, honestly considering the age it seems kind of abusive.

When they’re apart from each other, they’re much better. Her anger is aimed at more just causes, his determined nature and optimism make him seem more like a teenage wheeler-dealer than the sad sack he is when he’s with Alana. When they’re dealing with other characters they’re a bit more tolerable. The trouble is they meet other people far too often, and it branches off into plot points that only happen very briefly. For example, Gary is shown at the start to be a former child actor. Alana accompanies him to a performance (because he needs to be accompanied by an adult) and he hits the main performer in the back of the head. In this section, there’s tension with another child actor (played by Skyler Gisondo), but then he’s never seen or heard from past that section. Characters just flit in and out of the film without rhyme or reason. It feels like an ensemble piece that has been half-written and is going to complete the other characters arcs soon.

On the plus side, it has a very unique look to it. The moments where the couple meets with historical characters are quite fun, and the soundtrack is among my favourite of the year so far.

It feels not enough like a compelling story, and more like a 15 year old lying to his mates about what he got up to over the holidays “I dated an older girl, went to new york, played pinball, and sneaked a beer” A lot of people will like this, they’ll find it charming. Just wasn’t for me, I wasn’t charmed, and I found the narrative lacking. I’ve seen some people say “well you’re not watching the movie correctly if you’re looking for a narrative”. Possibly. The only Paul Thomas Anderson film I’ve seen before was Inherent Vice, and I didn’t rate that too highly either. Maybe I just don’t vibe with his style of film-making, it happens sometimes.

Scream (2022)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick synopsis: Twenty-five years after a streak of brutal murders shocked the quiet town of Woodsboro, Calif., a new killer dons the Ghostface mask and begins targeting a group of teenagers to resurrect secrets from the town’s deadly past. Brought to you by the directors of Ready Or Not.

So far, this is my favourite film of the year. Belfast was technically better and is definitely more important, but this is the one I’m more tempted to see again soon. Fun fact, this is actually the first Scream movie I’ve seen at the cinema. I thoroughly enjoyed it and look forward to watching it again with the knowledge of who the killers are. This is a film that’s REALLY going to benefit from repeat viewing. This franchise is a horror, but at its heart, it’s also a detective franchise. The audience looks at clues and tries to figure out who the killer is. It’s Poirot with pointier sticks. There are a few moments where the reveal doesn’t line up with what we’ve seen in terms of the strength and body mass of the killer. But it mostly works, it even sets up enough red herrings to catch you out. It mentions Billy Lomis from the first film quite a lot, treating him like the main killer, I felt certain that was to set up that Stu Macher would either return, or otherwise be involved in the reveal, with the motive being annoyance that he was forgotten and everybody focuses on Billy instead. Spoilers, that doesn’t turn out to be the case, but if I write a script based on it, that’s what I’m going to be aiming for, so spoilers for that.

By this point, the filmmakers know what the audience expects, and it plays with that. The opening scene has the usual violence and stalking that this franchise is known for, but the person survives. It’s clear that the directors, Matt Bettineli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, know the genre, and the franchise. There’s a shower scene where every few seconds it plays out like a jump scare is going to happen. The camera angles etc in scenes where someone opens a cupboard door mean that you expect something behind it, even if it is just a harmless character and the scare is fake. Instead……..there’s nothing. It repeats this trick more than once, and I love it.

One thing this film does which most horror films fail to do, is make the characters likeable. So often writers decide that everyone wants to cheer the deaths, and the best way to do that is to make the characters so annoying that when they get killed brutally, we’re happy, it’s cathartic to see them killed. But that means we have no emotional connection, and we’re spending most of the film stuck with characters we can’t stand. In this, even though the characters are snarky, sarcastic, and make stupid decisions at times, they’re all likeable. So when they die we’re actually sad. You’re not going to cheer the deaths in this unless you’re a sociopath, which a lot of horror film fans are.

Well, maybe not sociopaths, but a lot of film fandoms are quite toxic and hateful, incredibly resistant to any chance, or any role being played by a woman or someone non-white. This film takes aim at that and does so in a way that’s as sharp as the knives Ghostface uses. This will undoubtedly annoy certain people, but I don’t want those kinds of people to like the same films as me anyway, so fuck ’em. The killers reveal is both stupid and genius, and again, I’m sure will annoy a lot of people but I loved it. But I loved this whole film, it does so much so well. The performances are great, it’s very funny, and has a great selection of music on the soundtrack. On that note, this has the BEST use of Red Right Hand in the franchise, not the whole song, but the metallic sound effect the song uses.

So if you like the franchise, go see this. The kills are brutally simplistic (at one point he just stamps on someone’s ankle), the script is smart, and it looks beautiful. A lot of franchises have done “re-quels”, few have done it as masterfully and as true to the spirit of the original as this.

The 355 (2022)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick synopsis: Spy shit happens. But with women.

I was looking forward to this, it looked stylish, slick, and fun. It had a great cast so it’s sure to be good. There’s one thing I didn’t notice before seeing it, something which would have affected how I went into it: From the director of Dark Phoenix. Obviously, that’s not all the director has done, he also wrote the 2015 Fantastic Four movie. If I knew that, my expectations would have been much lower, and I wouldn’t have been quite as disappointed.

It’s just so bland. It basically seems like the kind of film that post-2018 Bruce Willis would star in and go straight to streaming services, and not even one of the good ones. This is basically “What if Mission Impossible: But Vagina?”. It’s bringing nothing new to the table, nothing fresh, nothing exciting. It seems to want to have its cake and eat it, mocking James Bond films in one sentence and then taking a military plane to a gala the next, all in new clothes, new wigs, and futuristic tech.

It’s a shame as some of the performances are good, but if you came in after watching the trailer, and wanted a film of all these bad-ass women teaming together, you’re going to be disappointed. They spend a lot of time not liking each other, and one isn’t even introduced until the closing section. It NEVER feels like a group movie, it feels like a Jessica Chastain movie, featuring four other people. The narrative is focused almost entirely on her. So when she’s in conflict with another character, WE’RE in conflict with them. It would be like if the first Avengers movie focused entirely on Iron Man, and was also the first film in the franchise, oh and if it ended with “we probably won’t see each other again but we might”. The ending is in the trailer btw.

That’s how the trailer ends, an image they’re hoping will stick with you, so you know all 5 of them will end up on the same side, and alive. In the film it’s almost entirely pointless, the guy has been drugged and is about to be taken to a foreign prison. So why did they need all 5 of them there? By this point, he’s the head of the CIA, and they’re escaped criminals from different spy agencies. If one person sees them enter the house, alarm bells will ring.

It also spoils that his character didn’t actually die at the start. Although we know that anyway, if a character is killed but we see neither the death nor the body, they’re not really dead. And if they’re the main character’s partner in a cop/spy movie, they’re secretly a double agent who has betrayed them. So it’s not really a shock when he comes back, it’s expected. It would be more of a surprise if he was still alive. That’s the basic rule for spy films.

The other rule for spy films is that the action set pieces need to be entertaining. This fails that too. The geography of the fight scenes are confusing, the editing is too choppy (although there’s one piece of editing which is GLORIOUS where it cuts from someone being hit to a knife chopping a tomato), and they’re all ultimately rather boring. The characters don’t showcase themselves through the action either, there’s no uniqueness to the way people fight so everything looks the same. There’s no storytelling through the fight scenes, they’re just fight scenes. Compare that to the action scene in Shang-Chi between Shang’s parents, that was a fight that told us who they are, and developed their relationship through action. This, the only story is “shit gets blown up”

I mentioned in my review for Belfast that I thought the secret screening was this. I am very glad it wasn’t, I would have been disappointed to have seen this early. I’ve already forgotten most of it.

Belfast (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick synopsis: A semi-autobiographical film that chronicles the life of a working-class family and their young son’s childhood during 1960s Northern Ireland.

I will never go into a film as blind as I did this one. I’ve sometimes gone into films not knowing much about them, just watched a single trailer etc. A few times it’s just been the synopsis. Sometimes it has just been the title. This I didn’t even know that. It was a secret preview screening, I worried it was Cyrano, but assumed it would be The 355. I think this was quite unexpected, as when the title card came up there was a general feeling of “not what I expected, but I’ll take it”.

That was a great way to watch this film. It’s a coming of age story, and in life, you don’t know what’s coming. We don’t live in a horror story, or a romance story, we live in our own stories, the genre defined by what we see in front of us. What is coming is unknown, but we can make guesses based on what we’ve seen. It’s great to watch such an uncertain time period unfold through the eyes of a child. We see him play in the streets with childlike wonder, then shit starts going down. Considering when and where it was set, it’s not completely surprising, but it’s unsettling to see that kind of sudden terror interrupt something so innocent and pure.

That being the way to open is PERFECT. Then when more things like that happen they also stick in your head. This affects the way you watch the film. Even when nice things happen, even when there are moments of pure joy, the potential for sudden explosive violence is in your head. The fear that at any moment everything can go wrong is always in the back of your mind. That must have been what it was like though, so that alone does more to put you in their shoes than anything else similar but lesser films have done.

This feels like the most personal film in the career of Branagh, you can feel the genuine heart and love he has for the subject. The whole thing feels like someone is telling you a story, and the film is just in your mind as you try to picture it. He directs it beautifully, lending every moment a real intimacy.

The performances are great too, not just individually but how they interact with each other. The cast has such great chemistry that it’s easy to believe they’re all family. The one downside is that perhaps Dornan and Dench are too recognisable for this to be as effective as it could be, but that’s a minor quibble. The people you won’t know pull you in brilliantly. I didn’t know who Caitríona Balfe was before this but I probably should have (truth be told for most of the film I thought she was Cate Blanchett), I have seen her in things but she’s never stood out to me before now. She’s great in this, the torment she’s going through echoes through every moment of her performance. The true star, though, is Jude Hill, who gives a remarkable performance for someone so young.

So in summary, go see this. It’s a wonderfully personal tale and one that deserves to be seen.

The King’s Man (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: World War 1 spy shit

First off, that’s a weirdly awkward title. It feels like it’s designed to confuse people who are asked to get it as a Christmas gift for someone, they’re definitely going to accidentally get Kingsman. Awkward title aside, this is a fairly fun movie. The biggest flaw is that it doesn’t really feel like a Kingsman movie. Spy movies are usually full of futuristic gadgets and technology, so I was curious as to how this would be done in the past. Turns out, they don’t. The closest they get is “this is a parachute”.

It’s not as slick as the previous films are either. There’s nothing that comes anywhere close to the church scene from the first one. That’s kind of to be expected as those scenes were based around music, and with this being set during the first world war it would have been weird if they played modern songs during it, so the options were limited. Also, since the society isn’t set up yet, you don’t have the style that the other two films have. So this is a Kingsman film without the gadgets, the music, and the style. You know, the three things which are the cornerstone of the franchise.

It is weirdly fascinating though. It does play fast and loose with historical accuracy, but then there are moments that are more historically accurate than they need to be. Rasputin really was that difficult to kill in real life, he was poisoned, shot, then shot again when he got back up. Also, the moment where Archduke Ferdinand was killed was more accurate than you’d think it would be. He really did survive an attempted bomb attack, and then end up being shot because his driver took a wrong turning and ended up going past a cafe where Gavrilo Princip was sitting, who just stood up and shot him and his wife. I’m sure there are even more historical bonus’s that I missed, and I look forward to finding out about them.

If you look at this outside of being a Kingsman movie, it’s fine. It’s entertaining, it’s funny, it’s violent, and it’s interesting. There are a few small missteps though. One is the pacing. There are moments that are far too slow and plodding. This film is over 2 hours long and you can easily lose about 20 minutes I’d say. Especially at the start before the reveal, we know where the film is going and it takes far too long to get there. The other issue is the reveal of the “big bad”. It’s far too obvious. If a film like this keeps a character in shadow and doesn’t let you see their face for most of it, 99% of the time it’s because it’s a character the audience knows. Chronologically this is the earliest film in the series so it can’t be someone from one of the other films, and there’s really only one person the film has been introduced to that it could be. It’s way too obvious and incredibly disappointing, even when the film tries to misdirect you by thinking that character died, since you don’t actually see him die, you know he probably survived, that’s just basic film language.

If they revealed him at the start it could have been better. Yes, you would have lost the shock, but you would have gained tension. When you saw him in a room with one of the good guys, in the back of your head will be the worry that he’s going to kill them.

There are moments of greatness though. There’s an almost silent action scene set in No Mans Land which is incredibly ballsy and unique. Actually, the best parts of this film are when it’s on the frontlines, they provide the pathos needed, great action scenes, and fantastic character work. That section is disappointingly brief but does lead to a moment that will surprise the hell out of you. It’s one of the few genuine shocks I can remember seeing unfold on screen for quite a while.

So in summary. See this, but you can afford to wait until it hits television screens.

Rons Gone Wrong (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick synopsis: A socially awkward child gets a robot friend that is broken.

A lot of people like this film, I’d heard some very good things about it. My opinion? It’s okay. It’s not something I regret watching, and it is better than you may think it would be, but it’s not among the strongest kids films of the year (that probably peaked at the start with Soul and Luca).

It was recently made available on disney+, and I feel that’s a good decision. This film was made for family watching, everyone gathering around a television on boxing day and watching together while they’re too full of cheese to move. And as good as this film is, I’m not sure it will be in the public consciousness this time next year so they had to get it on there now to make use of its recent cinema appearance and positive reviews.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing bad about this film. It has heart, it looks FANTASTIC, and the cast is full of people you love. It has a good mix of people you expect and respect (Olivia Colman), actors you’re kind of surprised but it’s nice to see (Ed Helms), and then some strange choices that you can’t help but love (Ruby Wax).

This isn’t the first film to look at the growing encroachment of technology into kids lives, but it does do it better than others have tried, mainly because it seems to actually understand the technology. Watch something like The Emoji Movie for comparison which seemed like it was written by people who still call all video game consoles “Atari”. The interactions between the characters and technology are so realistic that it seems hauntingly dystopian. The humans themselves aren’t quite as well done on their own though. There are some moments between the characters in this that don’t really feel true, some interactions between them don’t feel earned.

Really the biggest downside is it came out the same year as The Mitchells Vs. The Machines, which dealt with similar topics, also had the main AI developed by a young black developer (Justice Smith in RGW, Eric Andre in Mitchells), and both feature Olivia Colman. So comparisons are inevitable, and when you do that, this can’t help but look weaker by comparison. It’s a shame, as look at it on its own and this is a fine movie. But it does seem destined to the Shark Tale to Mitchell’s Nemo.

Promising Young Woman (2020)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: Cassie (Carey Mulligan) attempts to get revenge on behalf of her friend Nina, who was raped and committed suicide after the perpetrator wasn’t punished.

It’s about time I got round to this. This, and French Dispatch are the last of the films from this year that I missed that I felt I needed to watch. I’m not gonna lie I was slightly apprehensive that this wouldn’t live up to the hype. Everybody was praising this film to the moon so I needed it to be really good otherwise I’d be bitterly disappointed (as opposed to just a bitter Lee, which is my default state).

I have to say I didn’t enjoy this. But that’s a good thing, this isn’t a film to be enjoyed. It’s supposed to frustrate and annoy you. You’re supposed to hate people a little bit. I’ve seen some people describe this as “anti-men”, it’s not, it’s “anti-rapists and people who enable rapists”, I get why some people might be confused by that and think they’re the same. I mean, they’re idiots but still.

That’s to be expected though, with a film like this you’re always going to get some negative responses from people who have completely missed the point. The biggest example of this was Variety’s review, which said Carey Mulligan wasn’t hot enough to pull the role off, describing her as looking like someone in “bad drag”. First off, Mulligan is fucking hot (and a great actress who NAILS every moment of her performance), but that’s not really the point. When she pretends to be drunk and a guy takes him back to his flat to take advantage of her, he’s not just doing that because she’s super hot. It’s not as though he’s sitting there at the bar going “hmm, she’s only a 7/10, I can rape someone better”.

The casting of the rapey fuckholes is perfect btw. They mainly consist of people who are normally known for playing likeable good guys. So when their true intentions come forth it means more. The world has this notion that rapists are all fat, disgusting, skeezy-looking men, ones who attack strangers walking alone at night. People don’t like thinking of them as “guys who knowingly take advantage of drunk women”, because if they did, it would mean they have to reevaluate their past behaviour.

That’s really what this film is, it’s about evaluating how people deal with and talk about rape victims. From the people blaming the woman for it because she was drunk, to the people who want to protect the rapist as they “don’t want to ruin their lives over a silly mistake”, to the lawyers who do their best to make the victim seem untrustworthy. They’re all things that the world is familiar with and put up with.

That’s why this film is so difficult to watch, it feels too close to home in a lot of ways. Also, outside of those (important) concepts and ideas, it does feel a bit too much like a series of scenes rather than a definitive narrative. There are moments where it could be tightened up a bit, particularly her “romance” with Bo Burnhams character. It feels rushed and ungenuine. That’s a real shame as it means that when the truth about him comes out, it doesn’t feel as crushing as it would otherwise. It should be a real “oh no, even HE is like that”, it should break you. It doesn’t, because you don’t really care about him, or them as a couple.

It’s a shame as if that was improved it would be a 10/10 film, as it is it’s just an 8/10. Still very good, but this has been a FANTASTIC year for films similar to this. Maybe if I saw it at the start of the year I’d have warmer feelings towards it. But with the memory of other films, it can’t help but feel slightly lacking. Still a great film with a killer soundtrack though.

Ninjababy (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: Rakel is shocked to find out that she’s 6 and a half months pregnant in this strange but wonderful Norwegian comedy drama.

Try to think of what film this could be based on that title. It’s actually a strange coming-of-age drama. The closest I’ve seen to it would be Juno, but tonally it’s different. That was quite twee and cute, this has more of a punk and comic-book energy. If they were people, Juno would sit there and read Jean-Paul Sartre, Ninjababy would be reading Persepolis.

Everything about it works well. Almost, the music seems a little wrong. I kind of want to watch this in Norway as it feels like the music was changed for the international release to be a bit more commercial. There are some moments where it works, but otherwise, it just seems like “generic pop song #52” over the soundtrack.

Kristine Thorp is wonderful in the lead role. It helps that she’s incredibly well written. It would be easy to make this character unlikeable. To have the audience reaction be “ffs just sort your life out for once” and think of her as someone who put herself in the situation by being irresponsible. She’s written well enough that you are with her every step of the way. Helped by her performance too, her facial expressions when she finds out she was 6 months pregnant, not 8 weeks, is devastating. She looks terrified, responding “take those fucking pills and shove them up the pill hole”. I have never seen Thorp in anything before, but has some of the best visual acting I’ve seen in a long time. At times cartoonish and exaggerated, at times subtle and realistic. She’s perfect for this, and without her this film would not have the heart that it does.

You wouldn’t expect a scene of someone shouting “Blood and suffering!” would be as heartwarming as it is when it’s done in this. I have no way of leading into that sentence, and no way of coming out of it, but I felt it needed mentioning.

Home Sweet Home Alone (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: Disney kills your childhood

When I look back on this year there will be a lot of trends I will think of in regards to film. 2021 was the year of female leads fucking shit up (The Columnist, I Blame Society), weird Nicholas Cage films (Pig, Prisoners Of The Ghostland, Willy’s Wonderland), and terrible sequels/remakes of things from the 80s/90s (Space Jam, Tom And Jerry, Coming 2 America). This belongs in the terrible sequels/remakes, but also fits another trend this year: I’ve watched A LOT more stuff online this year. Some have been brilliant, some have…..really not. I think this is the first year since I started this blog that the number of new releases I’ve watched at home has been bigger than the number I’ve seen at the cinema. That…….that kind of sucks to be honest. The advantage of watching at home though is that I get to make notes while watching it. This means that when I type up these incoherant rants I insist on calling reviews, that I can reference parts I otherwise would have forgotten. My notes while watching this? Well, they’re not really detailed. They’re just two sentences long:

  1. THAT’S NOT HOW PHYSICS WORKS!
  2. Just step to the side.

The thieves in this are idiots. There’s a moment where icicles are dropping from a roof as someone runs underneath them. If he stopped running then by the time he moved forward all the icicles would have already fallen, he’s really just walking into his own torment. I mean, it works cinematically because you might not realise that, but if you do, it ruins it. There’s another one where they walk on lego, instead of just, you know, sweeping it away. The worst “trap” is one that’s SOOOO stupid and unbelievable. He wakes up with VR goggles on which make him think he’s standing on the edge of a canyon in the middle of the day, instead of the reality which is he’s standing in a house in the middle of winter, in clothes that are covered in snow and soaking wet. Somehow this fools him, despite you know, him being able to feel his wet clothes clinging to him, him being cold, and there being no wind. I mean, I don’t want to be brag but I reckon that even if I closed my eyes I could tell if I was outside in summer or inside in winter in wet clothes. But some of us are just built different I guess.

But if you shut your brain off then it’s still funny, right? Well, no. The first two worked because you knew what Kevin was like, the film spent a lot of time with him so he was definitely the main character and you sympathised with him. This goes in the other direction, it gives the thieves a tragic back story. They are not looking for money or jewels, they think the kid stole something from them and they need to get it back because if they don’t then they will lose their house and end up thrown out on the street with their family. So we sympathise with them, a small part of us wants them to succeed because they’re obviously good people, and they’re scared of what will happen if they don’t get the thing back. This makes it less funny when you see them get set on fire or have snooker balls launched at their heads. Coupled with how damn annoying and brattish the kid is and it seems less “Christmas comedy” and more “Spoilt rich kid tortures poor people for his amusement”, it’s comedy, but only if you’re a rich sociopath who takes joy in the suffering of those less fortunate than you (Hi Donald, Boris, merry Christmas).

It’s a shame this is so bad as the cast is incredibly talented. It’s baffling that people as talented as this would be in a film this bad. It’s a massive disappointment, and one that I kind of expected.

Annette (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: The tale of an opera singer (Marion Cotillard), a bitter comedian (Adam Driver), and their opera-singing daughter Annette (a marionette puppet)

Not going to lie, I was apprehensive about this. I thought it would be a bit too “arty” for me to enjoy. Make no mistake, this is a weird film. But it’s weirdly enchanting. This is a real head fuck. I am still in shock. It’s not a film I watched and found myself investigating the characters and the narrative, this is something I watched and just let envelop me. It was an EXPERIENCE. It feels like something unique and special and I really wish I got a chance to see this earlier.

There’s a company called Luna Cinema who do outside screenings of popular films in unique locations (a lot of them are on the grounds of medieval castles). I would absolutely LOVE to get an opportunity to watch this film in a situation like this. One where the screen is comedically large and you get to experience it in a way that you’ll always remember.

There’s a real flow to this. The music flows into each other, the performances flow through with an almost ballet-like precision and rhythm, it’s apt that one of the core scenes takes place on a boat as watching this feels like you’re floating down a river.

The music is PERFECT for something like this. The soundtrack was composed entirely by Sparks (best known for This Town Ain’t Big Enough For The Both Of Us), and their music is perfect for a film like this. The weirdly etheral and violent tone their sound has suits being the musical accompaniment for a film, especially a film that makes the narrative choices this one does. On the downside, their unique vocal takes are INCREDIBLY hard to recreate. There are times where Adam Driver is a little flat but that’s only compared to what you know Sparks themselves would sound like, so considering what he has to do it’s to be expected that he wouldn’t nail it 100%.

So in summary, I’m not sure whether I loved this film or not, I’m not sure I would show it to others, but I know I HAVE to watch it again, I know I have to experience the complete package that this film presents, and I know there’s a chance every single person reading this will absolutely hate it.