2/9/15 (Part One): Stay Frosty, My Friends

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Ane Dahl Torp, Army of Darkness, auteur theory, Ørjan Gamst, Bjørn Sundquist, cabins, Charlotte Frogner, Christian Wibe, co-writers, Colonel Herzog, dark comedies, Dead Alive, Dead Snow, Dod Sno, Einsatz, Evy Kasseth Røsten, favorite films, Film auteurs, foreign films, friends, gore films, Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, horror franchises, horror movies, horror-comedies, isolation, Jenny Skavlan, Jeppe Beck Laursen, Lasse Valdal, Matthew Weston, Nazi zombies, Nazis, Nightmare City, Norwegian films, Peter Jackson, ski vacation, Stig Frode Henriksen, stolen gold, Tommy Wirkola, Vegar Hoel, writer-director, zombies

There may not be many guarantees in this world but here’s one that you can take straight to the bank: Nazis will always make great cinematic villains. After all, what other group is so synonymous with complete and total evil, so unburdened with any easy notions of humanity or morality? For filmmakers, Nazis are real-world vampires and boogeymen, historical realities where the “black hats” are so intrinsically part of the package that there’s never a need to sugarcoat or offer any sort of counterpoint: after all, what person, in their right mind, is actually going to stick up for these ghouls? Who’s going to raise their hand and protest the traditionally black-and-white presentation of these blood-thirsty bastards? If you think about it, Nazis are just about the best, purest personification of evil we’ve got: pure, undiluted hatred, with no possibility for empathy or sympathy.

While filmmakers learned long ago that Nazis make sure-fire villains, horror filmmakers have managed to one-up this notion of “ultimate evil” by taking it to its logical conclusion: ravenous Nazi zombies. What’s worse than a Nazi, after all, than a flesh-eating Nazi that can’t be killed? From cult classics like Shock Waves (1977) and Zombie Lake (1980) to more recent films like the Outpost series (2008-2013) and Blood Creek (2009), genre filmmakers have been mining this vein for some time, albeit with decidedly mixed results. For the most part, however, these films all have one thing in common: they portray their undead Nazi menaces as terrifying, dead-serious threats.

This tendency towards a more serious tone is completely obliterated by Norwegian writer-director Tommy Wirkola’s massively entertaining Dead Snow (2009), an honest-to-god horror-comedy that manages to make the threat of undead Nazis both suitably terrifying and impossibly funny. Similar to the early splatter-comedies of Peter Jackson,  Wirkola’s outrageous tale about a ski vacation gone very, very wrong is a high-energy romp filled with gory effects, incredibly rude humor and some of the most kickass action setpieces in the game. When the film falls short, it’s a slightly silly, rather predictable variation on traditional zombie films. When Wirkola and company lock into a groove, however (which is most of the time), Dead Snow is absolutely relentless, ridiculously fun and one of the very best horror films of the ’00s.

Dead Snow kicks off with that hoariest of old tropes, the group of friends heading to the country for some rest and relaxation. In this case, the location is the snow-covered Norwegian countryside and the friends are the usual mixed group of character types: we have couple Martin (Vegar Hoel) and Hanna (Charlotte Frogner); wise-cracking horror movie buff Erlend (Jeppe Beck Laursen); Hanna’s cousin, Chris (Jenny Skavlan); outdoorsy Vegard (Lasse Valdal), who’s dating Sara (Ane Dahl Torp), whose family owns the cabin that they’re headed to; Roy (co-writer Stig Frode Henriksen) and Liv (Evy Kasseth Røsten). For the most part, they’re all likable characters, although most are sketched as lightly as one would expect for this type of genre offering: Martin is a doctor-in-training who faints at the sight of blood, Chris is the “hot girl” who falls for the resident nerd, Erlend always has a relevant bit of horror movie trivia for any particular situation, etc…Again, nothing we haven’t seen before, although it’s a refreshing change of pace to have a horror ensemble that’s this likable: only the hardest of hearts would root against this batch of cheerful goofballs.

Since the film’s very first scene depicts Sara fleeing through the woods, pursued by shadowy, malevolent figures in vintage Nazi regalia (to the tune of “Hall of the Mountain King,” which is just about as epic as it sounds), we’re already hip to some strange happenings in these here parts, but we get our official confirmation when a mysterious stranger (Bjørn Sundquist) shows up at the cabin to pour Pernod all of the partying youths’ ice cream. Turns out that the area they’re in has a bit of a bad history: a particularly ruthless Nazi battalion, led by the stone-cold Colonel Herzog (Ørjan Gamst), terrorized the locals there during the waning days of World War II. After the locals turned the tables and massacred the Nazis, Herzog and a group of his men escaped into the snowy mountains, never to be seen again. According to the stranger, the group, known as the Einsatz, still lurks up there, somewhere, waiting for unwitting victims to wreck their ageless vengeance on.

We wouldn’t have a movie if our plucky heroes took good advise, however, so they kick the stranger out and keep partying. When Vegard takes off to look for his tardy girlfriend, however, we get that other reliable horror convention: the splitting of the group. As the various friends go about their business, monstrous figures lurk in the shadows until everything comes to an explosive head (literally) and the group finds themselves under frenzied assault from a mob of zombified Nazis, led by the rotted but impossibly serene undead commandant. When the zombie mayhem kicks in, it never quits, rocketing our group (and us) full-throttle towards their inevitable rendezvous with ultimate evil. Our plucky heroes will need to fight back with everything they have, however: Herzog and his minions are on a mission straight from Hell and woe to anyone who gets in their way.

From beginning to end, Wirkola’s Dead Snow is an absolute blast of pure, undiluted fun. I’ve already mentioned the resemblance to Jackson’s early films, although Dead Snow is anything but a Dead Alive (1992) rip-off, even though both films share similar DNA. If anything, the film often plays like a far more splattery version of Raimi’s goofy Army of Darkness (1992): Army of Darkness even features a Deadite general who bears more than a passing resemblance to Dead Snow’s Herzog. There’s a good-natured tone to the carnage and chaos that completely belies the often show-stopping violence: you wouldn’t think that a scene involving a character rappelling down a mountain-side, using intestines for rope, would be silly and giddy but, in Wirkola’s hands, it most certainly is. Nothing in the film is watered down and no one is safe, lending a bracing sense of unpredictability to the proceedings: any character has the potential to be eviscerated at any moment and the film has a blast playing with these expectations.

Similar to Lenzi’s zombies in Nightmare City (1980), Wirkola’s zombies are fast, ferocious and more prone to stabbing you to death than trying to take a chomp out of your ankle. While I’ve never been the biggest fan of “fast zombies” (or smart zombies, for that matter), the ones in Dead Snow work brilliantly. In many ways, the film is extremely action-oriented, even for a zombie siege film: similar to how Dario Argento filled his films with “murder setpieces,” Wirkola’s is filled with white-knuckle fights against the resurrected Nazis. While there are a few instances of more measured, atmospheric horror (such as the excellent scene where Chris is stalked in the outhouse), most of the film involves the zombies chasing down and butchering their prey right out in the open, as the poor humans put up whatever resistance they can muster.

And muster resistance, they do: if you don’t find yourself jumping from your seat on a regular basis, fist raised to the sky, as Martin and the others kick zombie ass…well, I feel kinda sorry for you. Whether it’s the awesome bit where Vegard attaches a machine gun to his snow-mobile or the truly epic battle between Martin, Roy and about a million dead Nazis, Dead Snow is one great set-piece after another. When the film really gets going, it rarely stops, inching on the brakes only to highlight some of the film’s more overtly humorous aspects.

The humor, of course, is the other thing: while many horror-comedies completely botch the chills-to-giggles ratio, Wirkola and co-writer Henriksen prove as apt with the funny stuff as the runny stuff. While much of the humor revolves around gross-out gags and decidedly immature, politically incorrect observations about the world at large, there’s an underlying element of razor-sharp, insightful, pitch-black satire that serves as a sturdy foundation. One of my favorite scenes here (or in any movie, to be honest), involves the classic bit where Martin must deal with getting bit: after successfully going through all the usual motions, via a quick-cut montage, he stands victorious, only to immediately get bit by another zombie. It’s a brilliant gag that works on many levels (Dead Snow has lots of fun playing with standard zombie flick clichés) but is completely sold by Hoel’s all-in performance as Martin: his frustrated howl makes me spit-take every time I watch the film.

While the film is extremely well-made (the cinematography is quite attractive and the excellent score, courtesy of Christian Wibe, really heightens the action), it’s the incredibly game, likable cast that really puts this over the top. To a tee, none of the characters are unduly obnoxious (although Martin has a few quirks, like almost suffocating his girlfriend while messing around, that are admittedly worrisome) and we come to genuinely care for all of them. We spend the most time with Martin, our defacto protagonist, but they’re all a hoot, really. I’m particularly fond of Valdal’s “Spicoli by way of the great outdoors” take on Vegard: he cuts a helluva heroic swath through the evil Einsatz and never even looks like he breaks a sweat, which is a pretty sweet trick.

Ultimately, Dead Snow is just about as good as it gets for this kind of film. Genuinely funny, gory enough to impressive the hounds, full of likable, memorable characters and possessed of some seriously badass villains, everything about Wirkola’s sophomore film (his debut was a Norwegian “re-imagining” of Kill Bill (2003), believe it or not) is top-notch entertainment. While some critics bemoaned Wirkola’s followup, the tongue-in-cheek Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013), I found that film to be equally delightful, establishing the writer-director as a budding auteur along the lines of Peter Jackson or Frank Hennenlotter. Wirkola would go on to turn Dead Snow into a franchise with the equally excellent, English-language Dead Snow 2: Red vs Dead (2014), proving that he’s no flash-in-the-pan. Suffice to say, no one rides the solid line between horror and comedy quite like Wirkola does: as long as he’s driving, I’ll be more than happy to ride shotgun.

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1/2/15 (Part One): Painting By Numbers

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action-horror, Amaury Nolasco, Animal, Brett Simmons, Cabin in the Woods, cinema, creature feature, director-editor, dysfunctional family, Elizabeth Gillies, film reviews, films, friends, horror, horror movies, isolation, Jeremy Sumpter, Joey Lauren Adams, Keke Palmer, Movies, Parker Young, Paul Iacono, secrets, siege, Thorsten Kaye

Nearly as generic as its title, Brett Simmons’ Animal (2014) is the kind of film that you can practically see play in your head after just hearing a basic description: a group of people are chased through the woods by some sort of creature and take refuge in an isolated cabin, where they must make a last, desperate stand. Don’t get me wrong: there’s nothing wrong with mining trusted tropes…that’s part of what makes genre films so popular, I would imagine. In the right hands, even the mustiest old cliché can achieve some sort of new life, be reborn into something that’s truly unique and wonderful. After all, any “creature-in-the-woods” film has the potential to be THE “creature-in-the-woods” flick, the Citizen Kane (1941) of creature flicks, if you will. Sadly, Animal is not that film.

Five friends head out into the woods to spend a final weekend at a beloved camping area before encroaching development forever spoils their fond memories: brother and sister Jeff (Parker Young) and Alissa (Keke Palmer) lead the group, which also consists of their significant others, Mandy (Elizabeth Gillies) and Matt (Jeremy Sumpter), along with fifth-wheel Sean (Paul Iacono). After coming across some bloody human remains in the woods, the group runs smack into some sort of vaguely humanoidish creature: the creature proceeds to chase them straight to an isolated cabin, where they run into another group. This group consists of a couple, Vicky (Joey Lauren Adams) and Carl (Thorsten Kaye), along with an impossibly belligerent asshole named Douglas (Amaury Nolasco).

Once at the cabin, the newcomers find themselves as trapped as the group who currently resides there: turns out the creature chased them there, too, and it seems to be taking them out, on at a time. Unwilling to just sit in the equivalent of the creature’s larder, the two groups must attempt to work together, even though no one really trusts each other and Douglas is a dangerously paranoid, violent individual. The monster is constantly testing the security of their little “fortress,” however, and the danger of it finding a weak point and bursting in becomes all-encompassing. As long-buried secrets start to tear the groups apart, however, it becomes apparent that not all danger will come from outside: people can be just as dangerous as “animals,” it would appear.

In pretty much every way possible, Animal is as middle-of-the-road as these types of things get. The cast is decent enough, although their interactions always seem a little stilted and the dialogue is never anything to write home about. The “twist” revelation of Alissa’s group ends up being a tempest in a teapot, relatively speaking, and the character of Douglas is just such a complete shit that he never functions as anything less than a villain, even when he’s actually serving as the voice of reason. The creature design looks good enough from far away but reveals some pretty severe limitations from up close, along with the overriding question “Why a humanoidish design?” I would imagine it’s because the creature is actually someone in a costume but it doesn’t fit and seems to raise questions that the film has no interest in answering (or even addressing, for that matter).

On the plus side, Animal is well-made and reasonably tense, even if the whole thing is overly familiar and rather obvious. Simmons and dual screenwriters Thommy Hutson and Catherine Trillo (really? two writers?) are also rather fearless when it comes to killing off characters, which lends the film more of a genuine surprise factor than many films of its ilk. There’s also a pretty great scene lit only by a red emergency flare but I’m a big sucker for flare-lit scenes in horror films, so that was kind of a “Free Space” on my bingo card.

Ultimately, there wasn’t much about Animal that stood out (sort of like that title…yeesh…) but it’s definitely the kind of film that I could see doing decent business at the multiplex: fairly glossy, filled with attractive young folks and reasonably tense, Animal definitely reminded me of films like the Platinum Dune remakes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) and Friday the 13th (2009). Never as gritty, mean-spirited or intense as it needed to be, Animal is decent enough but never much more than that: for my money, the intense French film Prey (2010) got to this same place much more effectively and with an actual emotional punch that’s sadly missing here. Animal might appeal to horror neophytes but if you’ve seen any of its myriad peers, you’ve definitely seen it, too.

1/1/15 (Part Three): Down the Mountain, Off the Cliff

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avalanches, bad decisions, bad fathers, Best of 2014, Brady Corbet, cinema, Clara Wettergren, dark comedies, dramas, dysfunctional family, family vacations, Fanni Metelius, favorite films, film reviews, films, Force Majeure, foreign films, Fredrik Wenzel, French Alps, friends, Johannes Kuhnke, Karin Myrenberg, Kristofer Hivju, Lisa Loven Kongsli, marriage, masculinity, Movies, nature, Ruben Östlund, ski vacation, Swedish films, troubled marriages, Vincent Wettergren, writer-director

During the second day of a five-day ski vacation in the French Alps, a family of four happens to get lunch at their resort’s crowded, slope-side cafe. As they sit down to enjoy their meal, a nearby controlled explosion backfires and sends what seems to be an entire mountain-worth of snow surging towards the outdoor cafe: as the avalanche gets closer, crowds of panicked people flee in every direction, chaos incarnate. As Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) struggles to protect and comfort her children, Harry (Vincent Wettergren) and Vera (Clara Wettergren), she calls out for her husband, Tomas (Johannes Kuhnke), to no avail: turns out the family’s patriarch ran like hell as soon as the avalanche started, stopping only long enough to grab his phone and sunglasses. After the dust clears (literally), we see that the cascading mass of snow has stopped well short of the cafe: crisis averted, no one injured, everybody as you were. As Tomas sheepishly retakes his seat, however, the shocked stares from his disbelieving wife and kids are much louder than the mountain-side detonations: the next three days are going to feel like years…and not particularly good ones, at that.

This lapse of parental/spousal support forms the crux of writer-director Ruben Östlund’s brittle, frigidly humorous Force Majeure (2014), a thorny examination of the changing nature of gender roles, the passive-aggressive ways in which spouses needle at each other and the subtle ways in which self-preservation is as much a learned skill as an inherent instinct. While precious little about Östlund’s film is laugh-out-loud funny, there’s an ironic tilt to the film’s cap that belies the seemingly black-and-white nature of its subject: by their very natures, human are absurd animals and any attempt to bring order to the absurdity just makes it that much more absurd.

From the jump, Östlund drops subtle hints about the true nature of Tomas and Ebba’s relationship: she dotes on the children but seems decidedly less focused on her husband, he’s on a much-needed vacation from work but still spends an inordinate amount of time checking his phone. There seems to be a disconnect between the two long before Tomas’ act of cowardice tosses everything wholesale over the falls, leaving us to believe that this wasn’t the only straw, just the one that snapped the camel in two.

In certain ways, Force Majeure echoes Kurosawa’s Rashomon (1950) in that much of the external conflict between Tomas and Ebba stems from a fundamental difference in their versions of events at the cafe: Tomas firmly believes that he did not, in fact, run away, even though the video evidence is right on the phone that he managed to grab. As Tomas continues to push his version of events, his nit-picking and wheedling has the effect of making Ebba seem like an idiot, which only serves to push the two further apart.

Östlund expands the tableau out a little with the inclusion of Fanni (Fanni Metelius) and Mats (Kristofer Hivju), old friends of Tomas and Ebba’s who also find themselves at the same resort. As the couple attempts to rope their friends into supporting their individual versions of events, age difference starts to play a part: Mats and Tomas are older than Fanni and Ebba, which explains why Ebba jumped into action and Tomas didn’t. If Fanni and Mats had been on the slopes that day, Fanni posits, they would have reacted the exact same way. Cue Mat’s wounded masculine ego as he steadfastly disputes his wife’s assumption about his possible heroic tendencies. In no time at all, the two couples are at each other’s throats, with the women seeking to support each other while the men seek to reaffirm their stricken masculinity on the mountain-side in any way possible. Meanwhile, neither Harry nor Vera can even look their parents in the eye: as far as they’re concerned, everybody fucked up and assigning blame is sort of moot…from the mouths of babes, eh?

Concise, intimate and dedicated to the difficult relationship issues that others might gloss over, Östlund’s Force Majeure is quite the piece of art, aloof and emotionless as it might be. While it would have been the easiest thing possible to vilify Tomas, Östlund isn’t interested in any facile, easy answers: rather, he uses the film’s conclusion as a way to flip the script, indicting Ebba’s judgment in the same way that Tomas’ was impugned earlier. There are no easy answers in crisis situations, he seems to be saying, and any hard-and-fast rules are largely without merit: men and women will do what they will do, regardless of how “right” or “wrong” it is.

In a day and age when the very notions of masculinity and femininity are being redefined on a near constant basis, Force Majeure examines the issue from a multifaceted approach: age, gender and societal expectations all play a role in what transpires…remove any one factor, Östlund seems to be saying, and the whole complicated mess comes tumbling straight to the ground. Nowhere is this point made more evident than the scene where Mats and Tomas hit the slopes together, only to suffer another wound to their egos at the hands of a seemingly flirtatious female skier: as the situation escalates from amusing to awkward to rather horrible, it’s as if Östlund is giving us a short survey on the various ways in which men and women (poorly) interact. Despite being established as the “better” version of Tomas, Mats ends up being just as ridiculous and over-reactive as his friend when the chips are down.

One of the most interesting discussions in the film involves the old-fashioned patriarchal notion of the father/husband as “protector” of the family. If one were to apply modern conceptions of gender neutrality on the issue, Tomas would be no more responsible for solely “protecting” his family than Ebba would be solely responsible for nurturing them. Under this ideal, Tomas may not have acted heroically but he was acting instinctively, as a human animal. Tomas’ actions only prove explicitly cowardly if one examines his actions under the guise of traditional patriarchy/masculinity: as an “old-school” father/husband, Tomas is a roaring failure, putting his own concerns and safety above those of the family he’s sworn to protect. In a way, Östlund gets to work both sides of the argument with equal aplomb, right down to the finale, which re-frames the “protector” role in a way that makes Ebba the deficient one, not Tomas. It’s dirty pool, in a way, but really opens the film up to examination and interpretation from a number of angles.

So…Force Majeure is one of the cleverest, most cutting and insightful films of the year…is it actually a good film, though? In reality, Östlund’s film isn’t just good: it actually borders on the “quite extraordinary” end of things. For one thing, Force Majeure may have the single best cinematography of the year, with the possible exception of Wes Anderson’s exceptional Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Cinematographer Fredrik Wenzel fashions some truly jaw-dropping shots: with brilliant azure skies, pristine white snow and brightly colored accents like the vibrant red location markers, Force Majeure is absolute and complete eye candy. There are a couple of nighttime mountain shots that are nothing short of stunning (the one with the toy airplane is pretty enough to hang in a museum) and the mountain setting has a grandeur and immensity to it that the whole experience becomes rather humbling: when compared to the beautifully rugged natural worlds, Tomas, Ebba, their kids (and us) are really just about as small and insignificant as it gets.

While Kuhnke is solid as the increasingly childish Tomas (his temper tantrum/breakdown is really something to behold), Kongsli’s turn as Ebba is the real meat of the matter: her slow-burn evolution from slightly put-upon to completely shattered would be heartbreaking if Östlund hadn’t muddied the water enough to offer some shades of doubt. There are moments during Force Majeure where Kuhnke and Kongsli deliver mountains worth of character development without uttering so much as a word: in particular, Östlund uses the family’s nightly ablutions to subtly portray the disintegration of the family unit, from happy unit to miserable individuals. It’s a wonderfully cinematic effect and one of the many little details that make Östlund’s film so constantly fascinating.

Despite how much I liked and respected Force Majeure, there were still a couple of issues that didn’t sit quite right with me. From a technical standpoint, I wasn’t big on the occasional switches to a 1st-person POV: these tended to take me out of the story and I couldn’t really see any notable reason for the affectation. It was actually one of the few points in the film that felt like style for style’s sake, which might be why it stuck out so much. I also felt that the film could, on occasion, get a little heavy-handed: by the final reel, there’s so much hand-wringing and distraught emotions that the formerly chilly film runs the risk of getting a little too over-heated. Finally, while I appreciated the ironic intent behind the final “twist,” it also had the effect of sending the movie off without any real sort of conclusion. Not a critical blow, mind you, since Östlund’s intent is pretty clear. For my money, however, the finale felt more like a non-committal shrug than the decisive statement that the film seemed to be building up to. It worked, ultimately, but could have hit quite a bit harder, as far as I’m concerned.

Ultimately, however, any quibbles are just that: minor irritations that do nothing to sully the overall positive impression of the film. Force Majeure is the kind of knotty, intelligent and quietly subversive independent film that we could use a whole lot more of: when the external explosions match the internal detonations, Force Majeure is just about as perfect an examination of a troubled marriage as one could find. In the end, deciding Tomas’ ultimate level of culpability will depend on lots of factors, not the least of which is the individual ideas and “baggage” that individual viewers bring to the proceedings. Determining Ruben Östlund’s abilities as a formidable filmmaker, however, is a much easier task: one simply needs to open their eyes and the proof is right there on the screen, for everyone to see.

12/30/14 (Part Two): Deja Vu All Over Again

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adult friendships, Alex Manugian, cinema, Coherence, comets, dinner parties, directorial debut, doppelgängers, doubles, Elizabeth Gracen, Emily Foxler, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, friends, Hugo Armstrong, James Ward Byrkit, Kristin Ohrn Dyrud, Lauren Maher, Lorene Scafaria, Maury Sterling, Movies, neighbors, Nic Sadler, Nicholas Brendon, Outer Limits, parallel universe, probability, quantum physics, sci-fi, Timecrimes, Twilight Zone, writer-director

On the night of a comet’s passage into Earth’s orbit, a group of four couples meet for dinner at one of their houses. As the friends hang out and talk, they notice that they’ve all lost cell reception. When the lights suddenly go out, the group heads outside only to discover that the entire neighborhood seems to have lost power…with the exception of a single house several streets down, that is. A hesitant mission to explore the mysteriously lit house returns with information but it’s not the kind of thing anyone wants to hear: the house is full of people, all right…eight people that look just like them.

That’s the basic set-up for writer James Ward Byrkit’s directorial debut, Coherence (2014), an exceptionally smart little bit of sci-fi paranoia that neatly slots into a year that saw a plethora of doppelgänger/double films, including the similar +1 (2014). If some of the execution comes across as a bit rushed and the acting often veers into the rough end of things, there’s no shortage of ambition here and Byrkit nails a creepy tone often enough to justify hanging in for the ride. There’s also a genuine sense of intelligence here that pushes Coherence into a select group of films that include Timecrimes (2007) and Primer (2004), nice company for a first-time director to be in. There are even times where the film achieves the kind of unexplained, Lovecraftian dread that made Denis Villeneuve’s Enemy (2014) one of my favorite films of the year: again, not bad company to be in at all.

Part of what makes Coherence such an effective film is the way in which Byrkit threads the notions of cause-and-effect and probability through the entire narrative, which twists and turns on itself like a snake. At times, the films many whiplash twists can get a bit dizzying but it never feels overwhelming, mostly because the script doles out information and audience support as needed without ever feeling overly expository. There’s still enough doubt by the film’s conclusion to make it relatively open-ended, although it feels more like a choice than the kind of “backed into a corner” resolution that can often result from this kind of film. While some of the film’s rationalizations come across as a little wonky, it never feels silly or improbable.

Another aspect of Coherence that struck me as particularly impressive was the way in which the film managed to recall the feel of vintage Twilight Zone or Outer Limits episodes without ever seeming like a slavish imitation. In particular, the basic setup reminded me of the classic “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” episode, at least on a surface level. This impression was also driven home by the film’s editing style, which often felt as if it left room for commercial breaks, for some inexplicable reason: while I wasn’t a fan of this particular quirk in the slightest, I do admit that the enjoyed the Twilight Zone association immensely.

If I had any real issue with Byrkit’s debut (the filmmaking was generally fine, although the shaky cam and over-reliance on close-ups could be distracting), it definitely resides with the often hit-or-miss acting. When the ensemble connects, they definitely feel authentic, which lends a chilling sense of realism to the admittedly bizarre events around them. When they don’t, however, the whole thing tends to become amateurish and rather over-the-top. In particular, Hugo Armstrong and Nicholas Brendon are prime offenders as Hugh and Mike, respectively. Armstrong never really comes across as anything more than shouty and blustery, which strips any nuance from his character and makes him seem like a particularly obnoxious plot contrivance. Brendon is also over-the-top but I lay quite a bit of the blame for that at Byrkit’s feet: as written, the character of Mike is a complete mess and serves only to add unnecessary melodrama to scenes that don’t need it. His constant kvetching about his drinking gets old fast and I could never fully understand his motivations.

On the plus side, Emily Foxler is quite good as Em and provides a fairly well-rounded protagonist. She’s likable, which certainly helped in a film where the characters often seemed self-absorbed to the point of stage-bound artificiality. Maury Sterling was also consistently good as Em’s boyfriend, Kevin: the two actors had good chemistry together and Sterling was always an interesting performer to watch. Elizabeth Gracen’s performance as Beth could tend towards the OTT, ala Armstrong’s, but I chalked a bit of that up to story issues: she did some nice, subtle work, at times,  and I bought her relationship with Hugh part and parcel. For their parts, Scafaria, Manugian and Maher give good performances but don’t do much to stand out, although Manugian’s Amir does make a fairly ridiculous “bad boy.”

For the most part, I enjoyed Coherence: the film could be rough, at times (the lighting, in particular, was always rather flat and ugly), and it always felt like a few too many ideas were being stuffed into too small a space but there was no shortage of ambition here and many of the film’s concepts were the kind of next-level clever that you just don’t see in many films. While I ended up liking +1 just a little more (there’s something about that film’s gonzo pool-house siege scene that will forever reserve it a place in my heart), I will admit nothing but admiration for Byrkit’s debut. When it’s good, it’s subtly mind-blowing and is never anything less than completely thought-provoking. I, for one, will be eagerly awaiting Byrkit’s next film: if he can keep improving on the formula established here and tighten up the filmmaking, I have a feeling that he’ll be bending the fabric of space and time before we know it.

 

12/21/14: The Magic of Youth

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'80s punk rock, Alvin Strollo, Ann-Sofie Rase, Anna Rydgren, based on a graphic novel, best friends, Best of 2014, Bobo, Charlie Falk, cinema, coming of age, David Dencik, favorite films, film festival favorite, film reviews, films, foreign films, friends, girl power, growing up, Johan Liljemark, Jonathan Salomonsson, Klara, Lena Carlsson, Lily Moodysson, Liv LeMoyne, Lukas Moodysson, Mattias Wiberg, Mira Barkhammar, Mira Grosin, Movies, Peter Eriksson, punk rock, punk rockers, set in Stockholm, set in Sweden, set in the 1980's, Swedish films, teenagers, We Are the Best!, writer-director, young love, youth vs old age, youthful rebeliion

When you’re caught in the thick of it, adolescence pretty much sucks: your hormones are racing out of control, no one takes you seriously, romance is weird, adults are stupid, parents are worse, you just wanna get out there and live but everywhere you turn it’s just more rules and the only solution seems to be to blast your music as loud as you possibly can but it never seems to get loud enough to drown out all the fakers, phonies and assholes that seem to be everywhere you turn. It’s only once we get some wear under the engine and a few decades behind us that we fully understand what adolescence is: that one, pure chance to grab the brass ring with both hands and hold on for dear life before the world tries its hardest to grind you into dust.

Swedish writer-director Lukas Moodysson seems to understand this pretty well: his newest film, the unbelievably jubilant We Are the Best! (2013), isn’t just a love letter to teenage punk rockers or the long-gone ’80s…it’s a film about grabbing life with both hands, about making your own way in the world when none of the other options look great. It’s a film about friendships and first loves, about the awkward dance that boys and girls engage in because nothing makes sense but everything seems possible. It’s a film about standing out when everyone wants to fit in…about being one step behind pop culture because you like what you like, not what’s force-fed to you. It’s a film about how much girls rock (because they do), about how dumb boys can be (because they are) and about how clueless adults here (because they always will be). We Are the Best! isn’t just one of the best films of 2014 (although it is that, without a doubt): it’s also one of the very best films about adolescence ever made. We Are the Best? By the time the end credits roll, you won’t be in any mood to argue.

Set in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1982, We Are the Best! concerns the adventures of a pair of teenage best friends and fellow misfits, Bobo (Mira Barkhammar) and Klara (Mira Grosin). The two girls are outcasts in every sense of the word: they worship punk rock even though it’s “dead” (says the jaded purists who have since moved on to Joy Division), rock short, stubby haircuts and mohawks when the rest of the teen girls around them are showing off their long, lustrous hair and seem to exist in a world all their own. Picked on and bullied by those around them, male and female alike, and completely misunderstood by the bemused adults in their lives, Bobo and Klara only have each other but that definitely seems like more than enough to rule the world.

After an attempt to strike back at the shit-headed boys in teenage metal band Iron Fist results in them booking time in their school’s music rehearsal space, Klara and Bobo decide that they should go ahead and just start a band. As is often the case, neither girl can play an instrument but Klara divvies up the work anyway, assigning Bobo the drums and taking the bass as her weapon of choice. At first, the pair can do nothing more than bash meaninglessly on their instruments, whipping up the kind of din that GG Allin might approve of. Talent doesn’t really matter to them, however, since they really just want the opportunity to make their message heard: school sports suck and people should focus more time on starving kids and nuclear safety. Some things never change, eh?

Big change comes, however, when the girls happen to cross paths with another misfit: serious, pale, humorless and very Christian, Hedvig (Liv LeMoyne) seems like the last person the two young punk rockers would ever connect with. Just like them, however, Hedvig is an outcast at her school: during the annual talent show, she plays the Spanish guitar like an absolute wizard but still gets heckled and laughed at. Seeking a kindred spirit, as well as someone who can actually play an instrument, Bobo and Klara basically harass Hedvig until she joins their band and, by default, their little clique. Hedvig might not be much like her new friends but they give her the one thing she can’t get anywhere else: acceptance. As she begins to come out of her shell more, Hedvig starts to grow and develop as a person, right down to the terrifying/triumphant scene where Klara hacks Hedvig’s beautiful, long hair into spastic tufts on her head.

No coming-of-age story would be complete without a romance, however, which is just what Bobo and Klara get when they fall for the members of a local punk band. Young love is never easy, however, and when the boys’ attentions prove fickle, a gulf begins to grow between Bobo and Klara. Since she’s always lived in her friend’s shadow (Klara is the very definition of a force of nature), Bobo has never had the opportunity to shine on her own. As the girls prepare for their first public concert, in a rival town, however, tensions grow, cracks appear in the foundations of their relationship and they’ll all learn a very valuable lesson: when you have true friends, absolutely anything in the world is possible.

There’s so much great stuff to be found in Moodysson’s exuberant film that it’s a little hard to know where to start but let’s begin at the top: the triple threat of Mira Barkhammar, Mira Grosin and Liv LeMoyne as the three leads is so rock-solid, so damn perfect, that you just never want them to exit stage right at any point in the film. It’s hard to pick a standout, since each of them brings so much individuality to the table. Barkhammar brings so much co-mingled pain and sweetness to her portrayal of Bobo that the character feels utterly and completely alive: she never feels like the stereotypical “ugly duckling,” rather like an actual, deeply conflicted human being. For her part, Grosin’s Klara could have been a one-trick pony: brassy, abrasive and mouthy, Klara could have functioned as a sort of Bill Murray surrogate, someone to make wise-cracks and push her more demure partner into “discovering” herself. Instead, Klara is full of just as many contradictions, foibles and hang-ups as Bobo is. Some of the film’s very best scenes involve Klara’s extremely loving, supportive family: as is the wont of teenagers, Klara sees nothing but meddling and prying in their interactions with her but I dare you to wipe the smile off your face when her mother, little sister and father (on clarinet!) join in on their’s band’s jam session. Any other actor might have played Klara as too much of a petulant brat (and there is plenty of that here, to be sure) but Grosin finds the sweetness and sincerity to her “acting out.”

And then, of course, there’s LeMoyne: as the “straight arrow” that gets bent by Bobo and Klara, LeMoyne has the most pure “acting” to do and she’s absolutely killer. Nothing in her character is as simple as just “becoming” punk: the scene where she gets her hair cut is so amazing because we can actually see the conflicted emotions run across LeMoyne’s expressive face as if broadcast on a billboard. The filmmakers also make the wise move to never play her as a patsy for her Christian beliefs, an easy potshot in similar “young outsider” films: while Klara constantly ribs and teases Hedvig about her beliefs, LeMoyne’s calm, serene acceptance is a perfect, measured and, ultimately, very honest reaction. Moodysson could have played this for much more generic “tension,” but he realizes the key point that kids are both more and less accepting of others than their adult peers.

Lest it seem that Moodysson develops tunnel-vision regarding his young subjects, however, We Are the Best! makes plenty of time to deal with the adults in their world. Anna Rydgren is excellent as Bobo’s single mom, Lena: her fumbling attempts to re-enter the dating world mirror Bobo’s own blossoming into young womanhood and there’s some genuine poignancy to the scenes where Lena attempts to deal with the reappearance of Bobo’s father in their lives. There’s also really great work coming from Charlie Falk as Klara’s older brother, Linus, who’s left punk behind to focus on post-punk with the rest of his eternally bored friends. The scene where the girls get drunk and disrupt Linus’ party could have been as clichéd as they come, but Falk finds the perfect balance between Linus’ aloof attempts to be “cool” and his inherent responsibilities as a big brother.

Truth be told, however, all of the acting in We Are the Best! is pretty impeccable, as is the film-craft: Moodysson’s movie looks and sounds amazing, especially during the climatic concert set in the high-school gymnasium. Adapting his wife’s graphic novel, which recounts her own story growing up a punk in ’80s Stockholm, Moodysson turns in a tight, well-plotted and extremely clever film that manages to feature plenty of great dialogue without turning the kids into Juno clones. In fact, I daresay that the kids in We Are the Best! are just about the most authentic versions of such I’ve seen since the glory day of ’80s coming-of-age films like Stand By Me (1986) or The Goonies (1985).

Ultimately, We Are the Best! is one of those films that I can’t recommend enough: if you were ever young, at any point in your life, you will find something here to pull you in. Personally, as someone who grew up both a punk and an outcast, I found Moodysson’s film to be just about perfect. While the scene where the chauvinistic, condescending music teachers get their asses handed to them by Hedvig’s awe-inspiring display of fretboard mastery is one of the most badass I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing, the film’s true power can best be summed up in the scene where Hedvig plays an acoustic cover of Bobo and Klara’s favorite punk song. As her clear voice accompanies her gentle strumming, the audience is pulled into the same amazed trance that’s ensnared Bobo and Klara. As Hedvig gives voice to the angry, political sentiments in the song, we begin to feel her character make the transition from background to foreground. At its heart, We Are the Best! is a film about finding your voice and singing as hard and loud as you can, regardless of who’s listening or trying to hold you back.

While 2014 has been a pretty amazing year for film, all things considered, few movies have been this joyful, exuberant and full of life. Is We Are the Best! one of the best films of the year? Absolutely.

11/5/14: The One With the Pulp

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Adam Brody, adult children, adult friendships, Alia Shawkat, Allison Janney, Catherine Keener, cinema, co-writers, dramas, dramedy, estranged family, film reviews, films, friends, Hugh Laurie, Ian Helfer, infidelity, Jay Reiss, Julian Farino, Leighton Meester, male friendships, middle age, midlife crisis, Movies, Oliver Platt, romance, Sam Rosen, set during the holidays, suburban homes, The Oranges, troubled marriages, voice-over narration

While the “May-October” relationship between twenty-something-year old Nina (Leighton Meester) and fifty-something-year old David (Hugh Laurie) may be at the center of director Julian Farino’s The Oranges (2011), the “bromance” between David and next-door-neighbor/Nina’s father, Terry (Oliver Platt) is really the heart of the film. David and Terry, along with their respective families, are the kinds of neighbors that only seem to exist in cinematic versions of the real worlds, life-long friends who are close as kin and connected at the hip. This sense of unity is shattered as David’s family tries to come to terms with his infidelity and Nina’s family tries to come to terms with the fact that their beloved, if wayward, daughter is romantically involved with their middle-aged best friend. Bonds will be tested, relationships will fray and lots of life lessons will be learned: welcome to the “dramedy” as filtered through an after-school special.

Named after West Orange, New Jersey, The Oranges is anchored by the nearly constant voice-over presence of Vanessa (Alia Shawkat), David and Paige’s (Catherine Keener) daughter. Vanessa and Nina used to be as inseparable as their respective parents until Nina left Vanessa behind for the “cool kids” in high school, wedging a divide between the two that continues into the present. Vanessa is a rather aimless individual: she always wanted to be a designer but ends up working at Ikea, which is “close enough.”

Vanessa and her family’s lives are thrown into turmoil when Nina suddenly reappears after five years away from home. She’s just walked in on her fiancée, Ethan (Sam Rosen), with his tongue down someone else’s throat and has come back home to pull herself back together. Once home, Nina’s pushy mother, Cathy (Allison Janney), “encourages” her to go out with David and Paige’s son, Toby (Adam Brody), home for the holidays before heading to China for his job. When Toby has a little too much Christmas cheer, however, Nina ends up hanging out with David in his “man-cave” and watching TV. Turns out that David and Paige are kind of on the rocks right now: he’s been sleeping on the couch and she’s been throwing herself into her choir group with the kind of zeal normally reserved for hoarding animals. Before you can say, “Uh oh,” David and Nina have shared an illicit kiss, which blossoms into a full-blown love affair.

Once the affair hits the bright light of public opinion, however, things start to go rapidly downhill: Terry takes a swing at David, Vanessa calls her former friend a “slut” and blames her for breaking up her parents and Cathy pointedly asks her daughter if she enjoys “sucking on David’s old balls.” David and Nina are determined to make their relationship work, however, regardless of how it affects those around them. Just when Terry seems to be thawing a little, however, Ethan shows up on their doorstep, bound and determined to win Nina back: looks like everybody, especially the “adults,” are going to have a lot of growing up to do.

For the most part, The Oranges is a pretty by-the-book, formulaic “family in crisis” film, albeit one that hedges more on the side of the serious rather than the humorous: this is a “dramedy” where the comedy aspect is more ironic than anything else. With that being said, the film is blessed with a truly great cast doing great work: at times, this is enough to elevate the rather tired material, although there’s always an unfortunate “been there, done that” feel to everything. Keener, as always, is a master of the slow burn and her eventual breakdown is a textbook example of how to lash out while still keeping the audience firmly on one’s side. Shawkat, such a stand-out in Arrested Development, shows a serious side to her performance that’s rather bracing: there’s real pain and anger in her interactions with her father that are almost difficult to watch, at times. Janney gives another sturdy performance, with the highlight being the scene where she, literally, bumps into David and Nina at a no-tell motel. Meester, for her part, plays Nina as a flighty, impetuous and eminently selfish creature, so wrapped up in her own needs and wants that she doesn’t take any time whatsoever to consider those around her. It’s a rather unpleasant character, to be honest, and the filmmakers do nothing particular to sand off her rough edges: by the time Nina has completed her character arc, she’s the furthest thing from a sympathetic character but she certainly feels like a real person.

Without a doubt, however, The Oranges belongs to Hugh Laurie and Oliver Platt: their relationship is the true center of the film and provides the movies with the majority of its big emotional beats. In fact, the scene where the former friends finally stop and say hi to each other, in passing, is so impossibly sad and lovely that it handily eclipses any of the similar scenes between Nina and David or Nina and Ethan: this is a romance, true, but it’s not the one that folks might be expecting. There’s a breezy quality to Laurie and Platt’s interactions that feels 100% genuine, even in the more awkward, uncomfortable moments: this feels like how real people might handle this situation, warts and all.

Ultimately, The Oranges is a well-made, if exceedingly familiar, production: while the film breaks no new ground and feels remarkably free of real tension and conflict, the acting is superb and the movie is quick-paced and a pleasant-enough watch. More than anything, however, watching The Oranges brings up a very important question: why the hell hasn’t Hugh Laurie done more work like this? He brings a real sense of nuance and subtlety to his performance that’s light-years from anything he did on either Jeeves and Wooster or House. We need more Hugh Laurie, no two ways about it: The Oranges might not blow anyone away but it gives us that fix and that’s going to have to be good enough for the time being.

10/29/14 (Part Two): Now THAT’S a Spider, Man!

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31 Days of Halloween, Abbott and Costello, Alexis Kendra, Big Ass Spider!, cinema, Clare Kramer, exterminator, film reviews, films, friends, giant insects, giant spiders, great openings, Greg Grunberg, Gregory Gieras, horror, horror-comedies, King Kong, Lin Shaye, Lloyd Kaufman, Lombardo Boyar, Mike Mendez, military coverup, Movies, pest exterminator, Ray Wise, sci-fi, Where Is My Mind?

As a tinkling, piano-led cover of the Pixies iconic “Where Is My Mind?” plays on the soundtrack, we watch as Alex (Greg Grunberg), clad in exterminator’s overalls, strides in slow motion through absolute chaos: soldiers fire at something behind him, people run away screaming and buildings collapse into rubble everywhere. And then, we see it: a massive spider, as big as a house, sits atop a skyscraper like an arachnid King Kong. It strikes a helicopter out of the air with one giant foreleg, sending it flaming to the ground as the screen cuts to black. Text comes up on the screen: 12 hours earlier.

This is the first three minutes of Mike Mendez’s Big Ass Spider! (2013) and let me assure you: it is three absolutely glorious, nearly perfect minutes. If the rest of the film fails to completely live up to that decidedly high bar, well, that’s one of the prices paid for ambition. From the title on down, there’s nothing about BAS! that necessarily screams “must-see”: if anything, the film seems like it would be nothing more than a SyFy-esque romp with serviceable effects, some stupid laughs and lots of cheese. Quite the contrary, however, Mendez’s film has plenty of heart and is non-stop fun: it’s the furthest thing from perfect but it’s also utterly charming and, in the end, that’s always going to win me over.

Our hero, Alex, is a pest exterminator who’s ended up in the hospital after coming across the business-end of a brown recluse spider during a house call. He’s a perpetually nice guy but he’s also sort of a clumsy doofus: his attempts to flirt with a nurse (Alexis Kendra) are awkward, to say the least, and he always seems one misstep away from complete chaos. Alex gets called into action when the hospital administrator approaches him about an issue: “something” appears to be loose in the hospital and they want Alex to kill it, an offer he gladly takes up in order to wipe his exorbitant bill clean. When he learns that the creature appears to be a large spider, Alex feels he’s more than up to the task: “I become a spider to catch a spider.”

As it turns out, however, Alex doesn’t really know what he’s up against. You see, this is no abnormally large spider, as we come to see: this thing is obviously some sort of mutated monster, an acid-spraying, lightning-fast nightmare that uses the hospital’s ventilation system to move from victim to victim. Suspicions are confirmed when the military quickly shows up, led by no-nonsense Major Braxton C. Tanner (Ray Wise). Turns out that the spider in question was actually part of a government experiment that went awry (natch) and they’re now faced with a creature that will continue to grow, unchecked, until they can destroy it.

With the help of his faithful partner (and resident security guard) Jose (Lombardo Boyar), along with Lt. Karly Brant (Clare Kramer), a soldier who’s a terrible shot but seems to have a crush on the exterminator, Alex pursues the rapidly growing spider from the hospital, into the sewers and, finally, onto the very streets of the terrified metropolis. To destroy this dreadful abomination, Alex is gonna needs lots of help, some hardcore firepower…and more than a little luck.

Despite coming out of the gate strong (incredibly strong, to be fair), BAS! wasn’t the grand slam that I was hoping it would be, although it still ended up being a ton of fun. There’s so much about the film that really works that it’s easier to gloss over the elements that don’t, chief among them being the often tedious relationship between Alex and Jose. For the most part, Jose exists as a gentle Mexican stereotype, never mean-spirited, per se, but ridiculously clichéd, none the less. His constant banter gets really grating, after a while, as does the ham-fisted Abbott and Costello routine that Grunberg and Boyar effectively beat into the ground. Although I didn’t find their interaction to be as noisome by the film’s final third (they actually become a rather cute duo), there’s an awful lot of corn to wade through to get there. The film could also get a little silly, at times, and I noticed that the CGI tended to get dodgier the bigger the spider got: by the time it’s car-sized, we’re squarely in SyFy territory, effects-wise.

But these are all minor quibbles, ultimately, the kinds of issues that plague pretty much any B-movie. For the most part, BAS! hits all of its beats and manages to maintain a breezy, good-natured sense of humor that keeps things from ever getting overly serious…not that a film about a giant spider could ever be overly serious, mind you, but you get the point. Grunberg, most notable as one of the “heroes” on the bygone “Heroes” show, is pretty great as the lead here and ably carries the film: he’s a perfect combination of innocence and sass, never so smarmy as to be insufferable, yet steely enough to be believable. It’s also nice to see Wise play the straight guy, for a change: his take-charge Major is still recognizably Wise but it’s a much flintier version than we normally get. I also really like the ending, which gives the perfect set-up for a sequel (“What’s the biggest cockroach you’ve ever seen?”) without seeming too obvious.

If anything, Big Ass Spider! is a gleeful throwback to the era of good-natured, drive-in flicks, the kind of film that goes perfectly with a lukewarm sixpack of cheap beer, a carload of friends and a warm, summer night. It won’t reinvent the wheel, technically speaking, but it doesn’t really need to (or mean to), either. If the thought of a Volkswagon-sized spider rampaging through a city park and eating a pervy jogger played by Troma head Lloyd Kaufman puts a smile on your lips, this is absolutely the film for you. I might dislike real spiders with a fervor approaching religious zeal but I’m happy to hang out with this webcrawler any day of the week.

10/13/14 (Part Two): The Way Out Is Through

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31 Days of Halloween, Alex Reid, all-female cast, auteur theory, cave system, Centurion, cinema, cult classic, cult films, Dog Soldiers, Doomsday, favorite films, female friendships, feminism, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, friends, horror films, horror-adventure, isolation, Molly Kayll, Movies, MyAnna Buring, mysterious cave, Natalie Mendoza, Neil Marshall, Nora-Jane Noone, Oliver Milburn, Saskia Mulder, Shauna Macdonald, spelunking, subterranean monsters, The Descent, underground exploration, unexplored cave system

One of the biggest problems with the horror film genre, practically from its inception, has been the way it tends to marginalization women. In many cases, female characters exist solely as either cannon fodder or eye candy: the concept of the “male gaze” is so intertwined with the slasher film, for example, that it’s nearly impossible to separate that particular sub-genre from its inherent misogyny. One of the laziest defenses of these decidedly old-fashioned ideals, of course, is that the genre has “always been this way”: Dracula chased virgins, masked maniacs hunted nubile co-eds and T & A was just something to hold interest in-between creative kill scenes. This is, quite obviously, a pretty huge load of horse-shit: these things “have always been like this” because they benefit the status quo, pure and simple. Audience enjoyment of a horror film shouldn’t be precipitated on the need to constantly see bare breasts any more than it should be precipitated on the need to constantly see gore: the horror genre is so much more than the sum of (some of) its small, mechanical parts.

For the time being, the film world (particularly the horror genre) is predominantly a “boy’s club”: male directors still overwhelmingly outnumber female directors, although there are certain small in-roads being made. The Soska sisters, to name but one example, seem poised on the cusp of a massive filmmaking revolution…if ever there were folks duly suited to picking up the torch and burning down the institution, the fearless creators of Dead Hooker in a Trunk (2009) and American Mary (2012) seem like them. We’re a far cry from anything actually approaching equality, of course, but the same could be said for the subject, in general. The most important thing to keep in mind, I think, is the notion of the doctor “doing no harm.” If filmmakers are not willing (or able) to completely right the imbalance, then they should, at the very least, not be contributing to it. It may be a small gesture, in the end, but it’s often the smallest gestures which can lead to the biggest breakthroughs.

British auteur Neil Marshall’s sophomore feature, The Descent (2005), is one film that I honestly feel “does no wrong” as far as the subject of gender politics goes. For one thing, Marshall’s film features an almost exclusively female cast, a complete rarity in the horror genre: the only male in the film is featured in the intro and he’s out of the film within the first five minutes. For another thing, Marshall’s neo-classic is informed by feminism to the degree that patriarchal notions and power dynamics are largely left by the wayside: the focus here is firmly on the various interpersonal relationships between the women, rather than having the female characters serve as plot devices to complete a male character’s arc. The Descent is that most impressive of “message” films because it’s message is so basic, yet important: women are capable of kicking as much ass, sowing as much chaos, getting in as much trouble and being just as strong as their male counterparts.

Like Tarantino’s From Dusk Till Dawn (1996), The Descent is, basically, a two-fer-one: a bracing, thrilling caving adventure and a claustrophobic, terrifying monster flick. For the first half of the film’s running time, there’s no notion whatsoever that this will develop into anything more than a thrilling drama about the ways in which best friends can drift apart. Via a gripping white-water-rafting intro, we’re introduced to our protagonist, Sarah (Shauna Macdonald). Sarah’s happy, now, but sudden tragedy will strike, stripping her of her family and her old life all in one fell swoop. In order to help their friend recover from her devastating loss, Sarah’s friends, led by alpha female Juno (Natalie Mendoza), decide to “get the band back together” for one more spelunking trip, just like the good old days. The friends haven’t seen each other since Sarah’s family was killed, so this is an excellent time to re-ignite old friendships…and reopen old wounds.

Seeking a suitable “adventure” for her decidedly less-experienced friends, Juno ends up taking the group to an unexplored caving system rather than the “beginner” cave that she promised she’d take them to. Once the truth is out, Juno’s thrill-seeking new friend, Holly (Nora-Jane Noone) is stoked but everyone else is decidedly less enthused: what was supposed to be a nice get-away among former friends has now turned into something decidedly more intensive and, potentially, life-threatening. As they continue to explore the cave, a roof collapse cuts off their way back, forcing them to push forward into the unknown. There’s a great sense of thrill and adventure here: as the friends press on, they fear the unknown but there’s a visceral punch to the notion that they’re all boldly going where no one has ever gone before.

No more is this sense of hesitant excitement more pronounced than the white-knuckle scene where they must make their away across a seemingly bottomless chasm: as Rebecca (Saskia Mulder) makes her away across the cave ceiling, one agonizing inch at a time, there’s a genuine sense of the pioneer spirit. And then, of course, Marshall drops the other shoe: as Rebecca traverses the ceiling, she comes across something not only unexpected but existentially terrifying – an aged, rusted climbing spike driven into the otherwise untouched cave ceiling. The realization hits the friends hard: they’re obviously not the first cavers to explore the system, yet it doesn’t exist on any maps. This, of course, means that the previously explorers never actually made it out alive.

With this new knowledge firmly in mind, the group begin to notice odd things here and there: an abandoned mining lamp, strange cave drawings, mysterious shadows that seem vaguely humanoid but melt into the background whenever examined…it all culminates in the jaw-dropping reveal where they find themselves in a huge antechamber filled with all manner of skeletal remains…including, of course, human bones. From this point forward, The Descent becomes a no-holds-barred battle for survival as Sarah, Juno and the others engage in bloody, life-or-death combat with a group of subterranean creatures that appear to be an awful combination of human and bat. As the friends are hunted through the darkness by creatures that thrive on the inky emptiness, they must pull reserves of strength from deep within themselves, reserves that many of them never knew they possessed. Old rivalries and betrayals will surface, pitting friend against friend, even as the ravenous monsters press in from all sides. Far under the ground, hidden from the “normal” world above and completely off the grid, they most wage the most desperate fight of their lives or snuggle into their cavernous new tomb and accept that there are just some places that humans do not belong.

The first half of Marshall’s film is so gripping and enthralling, similar to the nature-based adventure setpieces from Deliverance (1972), that the appearance of the monsters seems destined to tip the film’s serious edge into total pulp territory. Instead, the horror-based second half actually dovetails perfectly with the more adventure-oriented first part, creating a beast similar to Master Blaster from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985). It’s a nifty hat-trick but one that Marshall pulled off with similar aplomb in his feature-length debut, Dog Soldiers (2002), which grafted an action-packed military film onto a werewolf movie. As an interesting parallel, Marshall’s first film featured only one female role (albeit a prominent one), whereas the follow-up featured only one (brief) male role in an otherwise all female cast.

While The Descent’s casting is certainly noteworthy, there’s absolutely nothing gimmicky about the concept: the film never feels like a jaded attempt to shoehorn diversity into a largely male-oriented genre but, rather, an honest, genuine attempt to tell a horror story from a feminine perspective. Most impressively, the cast never feel like female actors subbed in for their male counterparts: the themes and ideas explored here – friendship, betrayal, the importance of the family unit, the need for emotional honesty – all feel organic to the characters and there’s appears to be a genuine focus on the female characters. Despite a plot point that involves infidelity, there is a refreshing lack of male needs guiding the overall story: these are women who are perfectly capable and happy on their own, without the need to be intrinsically connected to male counterparts. In the truest notion of equality, the characters in The Descent are just allowed to be their own characters, for better or worse, and there’s no notion, at any point, that they’re merely marionettes being forced to dance for the male gaze. In a genre that seems to thrive on finding inventive ways to showcase distressed young women wearing as little clothing as possible, Marshall’s extraordinary film does the zaniest thing possible: it opts to just treat them like human beings and let the drama arise organically from the characters and situations. Fancy that!

As with Marshall’s debut, The Descent is an absolutely stunning bit of craftwork, featuring some truly gorgeous cinematography (the scenes lit solely by red flares are genuinely beautiful, conjuring up a haunted atmosphere that’s equal parts dreamy and Stygian) and some of the most impressive locations ever committed to celluloid. Truly, The Descent stands as one of the crowning achievements of the cinematic caving subgenre (narrow as that might be) and is practically the first and last word on caving-based horror films: there have been a handful of others but they all look pretty impoverished compared to Marshall’s flick.

The acting, as befits all of Marshall’s films, is note-perfect. Shauna Macdonald, in particular, is an absolutely riveting hero: while she doesn’t possess the steely reserve of someone like Lt. Ripley, there’s an honesty to her character’s actions that feels both suitably dramatic and grounded in reality. Sarah is not a fearless character strutting through an apocalyptic wasteland with gum in one cheek and her boot up someone’s ass: she’s a regular person whose preservation instincts propel her forward, even as her options seem to be running out right and left. Similarly, Natalie Mendoza could have played Juno as a shrill, one-note antagonist, someone whose sole function was to awaken a change in the main character. Instead, Mendoza infuses Juno with enough nuance to allow audiences to empathize, at least to some extent, with her actions. One of the most powerful moments in the entire film comes from the scene where Juno accidentally kills one of the party: her character has been cocky and obnoxious, up to that point, but the fear, pain and horror in her eyes are new emotions and Mendoza is a capable enough performer to allow each to bubble to the surface, in time, even if only briefly.

I fell in complete love with The Descent after my very first screening of the film (which happened to be in a theater, thankfully) and my opinion hasn’t wavered one iota in the decade since. The film is easily one of my favorite horror movies, of any era, and is one of the modern horror films that I feel completely comfortable with canonizing: I think that The Descent is a film that audiences and critics will be returning to for many decades, similar to any of the greats in the genre. Even viewed as critically as possible, I can find very few real faults with the film and the high points soar handily above the high points of many, many other films. The fight sequences are visceral assaults to the senses, the feeling of claustrophobia is so complete as to be almost suffocating and the film has one of the single greatest, most perfect endings in the history of cinema. No lie: if I were Marshall, I’d get a bumper sticker that says “My film kicked your honor student’s ass.”

 

10/6/14 (Part Two): Middle Age, Pints and Blue Goop

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31 Days of Halloween, alien invasion, auteur theory, Best of 2013, British comedies, British films, cinema, co-writers, David Bradley, Eddie Marsan, Edgar Wright, favorite films, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, friends, Gary King, horror-comedies, Hot Fuzz, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, male friendships, Martin Freeman, Michael Smiley, Movies, Nick Frost, obnoxious friends, Paddy Considine, Pierce Brosnan, pubs, Rosamund Pike, sci-fi, Shaun of the Dead, siege, SImon Pegg, the Cornetto trilogy, the Golden Mile, the Network, The World's End, writer-director, youth vs old age

Like most vacation destinations, nostalgia is a great place to visit but a pretty awful place to live. While all of us may spend at least some part of our lives pining for “the good old days” and hoping to relive past glories, there comes a time when we must plant our eyes firmly ahead and charge straight into the unknown, lest we find that our lives have become the equivalent of a hamster ball: furious motion with no chance of forward movement. In a real reason sense, nostalgia can kill…but it sure is a pretty poison.

Writer-director Edgar Wright’s The World’s End (2013), the third entry in his unofficial “Cornetto Trilogy” that also features Shaun of the Dead (2004) and Hot Fuzz (2007), is a movie that’s not only about the curse of nostalgia but also informed by this very phenomena: it’s a classic case of having your cake and eating it, too, if you will and it’s doubtful that many directors could pull it off as capably as Wright does here. The end result is wildly successful and, as far as I’m concerned, ranks as Wright’s greatest film, thus far, a towering achievement that manages to be equal parts gut-busting and thought-provoking. It’s a film that should be enjoyed by just about anyone but will have particular relevance to that portion of society who find themselves aging into versions of themselves that seem distinctly watered-down from their youthful ideals. For anyone approaching middle-age who’ve ever taken a long look in the mirror and asked, “What the hell happened to me?,” Wright’s got the cheeky answer: “You got fucking old, mate…it happens to the best of us.”

The man-child at the center of Wright’s latest opus is Gary King, expertly portrayed by Wright regular Simon Pegg, who’s managed to turn these type of roles into something of a cottage industry. From his start on the BBC with cult-hit Spaced to more recent films like How To Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008) and A Fantastic Fear of Everything (2012), Pegg has become something of the go-to guy for schlubs trying to relive their youth, characters who would rather get ripped at the pub, play video games all day long and avoid honest work than buckle down and admit that the care-free days are far in the rearview mirror.

In this case, Gary King is firmly stuck in the past: 1991, to be exact, which happens to be the year that he and his pack of friends attempted, but failed, to complete the Golden Mile. The Golden Mile entails drinking a pint at twelve different pubs, culminating in the titular World’s End pub. As far as he’s concerned, Gary’s life never got any better than that one debauched night and he’s spent the two decades since chasing that same dragon. He wears the same clothes as he used to, drives the same junker car, listens to the exact same mixtape and obsessively dwells on every minute detail of that era. When it all gets to be too much, Gary decides to do the only “sensible” thing: get the band back together, as it were, and give the Golden Mile another go.

There’s only one problem: Gary’s crew haven’t seen him in 20-odd years and many of them detest him with a passion normally reserved for baby-stealing dingoes. Never one to let common sense spoil a good plan, Gary goes about insinuating himself back into the lives of his former comrades, all the while trying to wheedle them into giving their old drinking challenge another try. Times, of course, have moved on and so have Gary’s “friends”: Andy (Nick Frost), Peter (Eddie Marsan), Oliver (Martin Freeman) and Steve (Paddy Considine) all have their own lives, jobs and responsibilities to see to and none of them, particularly former best friend Andy, want anything to do with their former “leader.”

Gary’s nothing if not insistent, however, and in no time, he’s got the group back on the Golden Mile. As they pub-hop, however, issues old and new continue to rear their ugly heads: Andy is now a teetotaling “party-pooper” while no one is willing to forgive Gary’s past (and present) churlish behavior. When Oliver’s sister, Sam (Rosamund Pike) enters the picture, new conflicts abound: Gary had sex with Sam in the bathroom on that fateful night so long ago, but it’s poor Steve who’s always pined for her. Just when Gary’s insensitive, assholish behavior threatens to tear the group apart for the second time, they become united in something that seems a bit more important: the group stumbles upon a sinister plot to usurp humanity and invade our planet, a plot which they seem to be in the unique position to foil…even they can quit taking pot-shots at each other, that is. As Gary and his friends fight for the very survival of our species, they’re also fighting for the survival of their long-gone friendships and relationships, seeking to move from the immature past into the responsible present. If they succeed, mankind will live to fight another day. If they don’t, however, we may just see a future that makes Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) seem more like public service announcement than flight of fancy.

The most important thing to note about The World’s End is how absolutely, completely and totally enthralling the film is: from the very first to the very last one, Wright’s film grabs the audience by the lapels and doesn’t let go. From rapid-fire dialogue to an endless array of inventive and (frequently) astounding sight gags to one thrilling setpiece after another, The World’s End is absolutely relentless. The film rarely comes up for breath and hardly ever slows down. This could, of course, be a recipe for one very tiresome film: nonstop chaos is almost impossible to pull off, as evidenced by the fact that even mostly successful films like Airplane (1980) feature as many leaden duds as high-soaring hits. Thanks to the exceptional script, sure-handed direction and fantastic ensemble cast, however, The World’s End is one high-point after the other.

Truth be told, I’d already fallen in love with the film by the time the opening credits rolled: the next 100 minutes simply served to reaffirm this feeling. While I enjoyed both Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, there was something about The World’s End that really struck a chord with me. Perhaps it’s the theme of aging gracefully into a more mature version of yourself…perhaps it was the wildly inventive invasion plot…perhaps it was just the fact that the film manages to hit all of its marks and then some…whatever the reason, The World’s End hooked me hard and refused to let go.

Since part of the film’s endless charm comes from the myriad surprises that it manages to throw at the audience, I’d be remiss to shed too much light on any of them. Suffice to say that the film features fist-raising moments galore: a spot-on reference to the under-rated Dead and Buried (1981); clever riffs on Invasion of the Body Snatchers; a throw-away visual reference to The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) that’s made my jaw drop, a little; the fact that the climax manages to revolve around not just one but two classic clichés of sci-fi cinema; Nick Frost playing a neebish…Martin Freeman taking his prim and proper caracatures to their logical extreme…the film is like an endless replenishing box of goodies, coughing up untold comic treasures at a moment’s notice.

The comedy’s not the only thing that hits the mark, however: The World’s End succeeds just as capably as a sci-fi/horror film, featuring some truly intense and frightening scenes. The moments where the Blanks’ eyes and mouths become the equivalent of high beams is a truly chilling moment, whereas the numerous fight scenes are brilliantly choreographed and staged. One fight in particular, which features Simon Pegg moving in and around a brawl while attempting to avoid spilling his treasured pint of lager, is pure gold, perhaps the single best fight scene I’ve seen in years. Make no bones about it: The World’s End is a very, very funny film. It’s also a very thrilling film, however: the two polar opposites are absolutely not mutually exclusive, in this case.

In truth, there’s very little real criticism I can give the film, aside from the fact that I felt the final coda was a bit silly and unnecessary. Aside from that, however, I found myself in a pretty constant state of awe for nearly two hours. The World’s End is a smashing success, a film that sets a pretty high bar for itself, right out of the gate, and then manages to effortlessly hurdle that bar. It’s a film that can be enjoyed by anyone but should be treasured by those folks with even a passing interest in sci-fi (classic and otherwise).

There’s one point in the film where Gary posits that something must be going on with the people in the town because they’ve “changed”: 20 years later and no one seems to be acting the way he remembered. He never once, of course, allows for the distressing notion that he might be the one who’s changed, not them. We’d like to believe that we’re the truest people out there, the equivalent of a bunch of Holden Caulfields stomping through the masses, pointing out “phonies” left and right. In reality, however, we’re all just as compromised as the next person: time and the need to survive make hypocrites of us all.

Gary thinks that if he can just retrace his steps, he’ll be able to unlock some sort of Fountain of Youth, some way to prevent any more of himself from slipping away. He’s wrong, of course: the most that any of us can do is face the future, keep our backs to the past and keep trudging forward. If we’re lucky, we’ll get to make the journey with some good friends and companions. If not, we’ll keep circling the drain spout of irrelevance, ending up as no more than the dreams that our youthful selves never dared to hope might one day come true. When an ultra-goofy alien invasion comedy can make you think about stuff like this, you have what I like to call a classic on your hands.

9/1/14 (Part Two): Sisters From Another Mother

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action, Amigo, auteur theory, Best of 2013, cinema, crime thriller, Don Harvey, drama, Edward James Olmos, Elizabeth Sung, female friendships, feminism, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, friends, friendship, Go For Sisters, Hilary Barraford, independent films, indie dramas, Jesse Borrego, John Sayles, Kathryn Westergaard, LisaGay Hamilton, Mahershala Ali, McKinley Belcher III, Mexico, missing son, Movies, parole officer, Vanessa Martinez, writer-director, Yolonda Ross

True friendship is a rare beast, indeed. Not the friendships of convenience that the modern age makes so necessary, mind you, but the honest to god, flesh and blood, right in front of your face kind of friendships that last for lifetimes. These are the kinds of friendships for which the cliché “take a bullet” is actually a truth…the kind that blur the line between kin and acquaintance. If we’re lucky, we’ll all have one of those friendships at some point in our lives, although it’s not a given: friendships like this need to be worked at, maintained and that kind of dedication just isn’t for everyone. It’s easy to say that you’ll always be there for someone but much harder to actually deliver on said promise.

In many ways, legendary writer/director John Sayles’ most recent film, Go For Sisters (2013), is a tribute to true friendships of the type described above. It’s also a whip-smart, fast-paced, lean and mean crime thriller but that’s just how Sayles has always done things: from as far back as The Brother From Another Planet (1984), Sayles has mixed social critique and genre conventions to dizzying effect, resulting in some truly unforgettable films. Under the guise of historical dramas, thrillers, police procedurals and sci-fi films, Sayles has managed to comment on everything from race relations and immigration to U.S. colonialism, the sins of the father, corruption and greed. While his body of a work as a writer/director is impressive enough on its own, Sayles has also been something of a writing “gun for hire” in Hollywood, as it were, churning out the scripts for everything from Roger Corman’s original Piranha (1978) to Alligator (1980) and Clan of the Cave Bear (1986). In every sense of the term, John Sayles is a living legend and any new Sayles film is an event worth celebrating: Go For Sisters reminds us that the filmmaker is as relevant today as he was way back in 1979.

The “true friends” in Go For Sisters take the form of Bernice (LisaGay Hamilton) and Fontayne (Yolonda Ross), life-long friends who’ve become separated by the inexorable march of time and change. While they used to be quite the wild pair, Bernice’s current job as a parole officer bespeaks of a rather significant life change. The two reconnect when Bernice ends up being Fontayne’s parole officer: Bernice may have gone the straight and narrow but Fontayne still struggles to escape the cycle of crime and drugs that’s held her down for so many years. At first glance, it seems like these former friends won’t have a lot of common ground to stand on but life, as always, is never that simple.

It turns out that Bernice is having her own problems, namely the disappearance of her wayward military vet son, Rodney (McKinley Belcher III). Since Rodney is a bit of a wild child, himself, Bernice isn’t sure whether her inability to contact him is due to his lifestyle or a genuine problem. When she sees Fontayne again, however, Bernice sees her ticket into the “underworld” via her wayward friend’s illicit connections. While Fontayne is less than thrilled with the prospect of violating her parole nine ways to Sunday, Bernice assures her that it can’t be a violation if her parole officer is sanctioning it. Before long, the pair get a lead and head for Mexico, putting Fontayne into a potentially boiling pot of scalding trouble: if hanging out with known felons is a parole no-no, skipping the country must rank as some sort of hell-no.

Once in Mexico, Bernice and Fontayne team-up with disgraced former police officer-turned bounty hunter Freddy Suarez (Edward James Olmos) and continue their hunt for Rodney, coming ever closer to the truth behind his disappearance. The truth, of course, ends up being even crazier than they imagined and involves illegal Chinese immigrants, a vicious Mexican drug lord and the mysterious, sinister Mother Han (Elizabeth Sung), who just may be pulling the strings behind it all. As Bernice and Fontayne get deeper and deeper into the muck, they rekindle their formerly extinguished friendship and find out the clearest, most important truth of all: when you have real friends, you can overcome any obstacle, fight any foe and win any battle. Bernice and Fontayne may be outgunned, outmanned and out-maneuvered but as long as they have each other, the bad guys just don’t stand a chance.

In an era when women seem to increasingly get the shit end of the stick in both the “real world” and pop culture, it’s not only refreshing but downright necessary to have films like Go For Sisters. Not only are Bernice and Fontayne the central figures of Sayles’ film but they’re stronger than any male character in the film. Even the heroic, steadfast Freddy Suarez is nothing compared to the rock-solid female leads: if anything, Go For Sisters reminds of a less flamboyant, cliche-ridden version of one of Pam Grier’s classic blaxploitation roles. There’s no point in the film where either woman feels like a victim, someone in need of male protection or male guidance: one of the most telling points in the film is the one where Fontayne explains her homosexuality with the dismissive, “boys turn into men…you know how that goes.” If we don’t already, we get a pretty good example via the pairs various interactions throughout the film, with the exception of Edward James Olmos’ pseudo-white knight Suarez.

Far from being a clinical, cold treatise on racial and gender politics, however, Go For Sisters wraps everything in the guise of a cracking-good crime/mystery/thriller. Like his similar Lone Star (1996), Sayles wraps everything around a pretty good mystery: it’s no Chinatown (1974) but there are plenty of satisfying twists and turns, along with some truly kickass action scenes. The bit where Fontayne turns an empty liquor bottle into a “gun” is a classic (“I always carry a Colt .45 with me”) and Bernice projects nothing but fire and grit.

While the filmmaking is typically great (in particular, cinematographer Kathryn Westergaard puts some truly stunning visuals up on the screen, particularly once the action moves south of the border), the acting is a true thing of beauty. LisaGay Hamilton and Yolonda Ross are absolutely perfect as the former/current best-friends: their relationship never feels anything less than completely genuine, including their halting “getting to know you again” time. Anyone who’s ever fallen out with and then reconnected with a dear friend should certainly recognize more than a few beats here. As previously mentioned, Bernice and Fontayne are completely awesome, ass-kicking protagonists, the kind that any film would be proud to host and much credit must be due the flawless performance.

Just as good, for different reasons, is Edward James Olmos’ portrayal of the kindly bounty hunter: Olmos is, without a doubt, one of our most storied actors and there’s something truly cool about seeing him play such an unflappable, badass individual. Like something out of an old spaghetti Western, Olmo’s Freddy Suarez is a polite, well-spoken, barely contained tornado: “You musta been some hot shit behind that badge, Freddy,” Fontayne praises him, at one point. Freddy smiles and replies, “They called me The Terminator” and there’s absolutely no way we don’t believe him.

Ultimately, Go For Sisters is the kind of unflashy, old-fashioned, character-driven film that will probably seem like a museum fossil in this day and age. Tightly written, expertly crafted, beautifully shot, wildly entertaining…pretty much just what you should expect from a John Sayles film. If you’ve always been a fan, Go For Sisters is going to be another jewel in a long, illustrious career. If you’re new to the simple majesty of this master storyteller, strap yourself in and prepare yourself for one hell of an experience. It’s tempting to say that the master’s back but here’s the thing: he never went anywhere in the first place.