2017 Oscar Nominee Predictions

Best Picture

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk

La La Land

Silence

Moonlight

The Birth of a Nation

Manchester by the Sea

Best Leading Actor

Denzel Washington (Fences)

Casey Affleck (Manchester by the Sea)

Ryan Gosling (La La Land)

Tom Hanks (Sully)

Michael Keeton (The Founder)

Best Leading Actress

Viola Davis (Fences)

Emma Stone (La La Land)

Natalie Portman (Jackie)

Annette Bening (20th Century Women)

Ruth Negga (Loving)

Best Director

Ang Lee (Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk)

Martin Scorsese (Silence)

Nate Parker (The Birth of a Nation)

Damien Chazelle (La La Land)

Kenneth Lonergan (Manchester by the Sea)

Clint Eastwood (Sully)

Best Supporting Actor

Liam Neeson (Silence)

Hugh Grant (Florence Foster Jenkins)

Michael Shannon (Nocturnal Animals)

Stephen McKinley Henderson (Fences)

Mahershala Ali (Moonlight)

Best Supporting Actress

Michelle Williams (Manchester by the Sea)

Naomie Harris (Moonlight)

Nicole Kidman (Lion)

Greta Gerwig (20th Century Women)

Margo Martindale (The Hollars)

Best Animated Feature

Moana (Walt Disney Pictures)

Zootopia (Walt Disney Pictures)

Kubo and the Two Strings (Laika)

The Red Turtle (Sony Pictures Classics)

Miss Hokusai (GKIDS)

Best Cinematography

Silence (Rodrigo Prieto)

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (John Toll)

La La Land (Linus Sandgren)

Arrival (Bradford Young)

Nocturnal Animals (Seamus McGarvey)

Best Editing

La La Land (Tom Cross)

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (Tim Squyre)

Silence (Thelma Schoonmaker)

Fences (Hughes Winborne)

Jackie Sebastián Sepúlveda

Best Original Screenplay

La La Land (Damien Chazelle)

Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan)

Moonlight (Barry Jenkins, Tarell McCraney)

Loving (Jeff Nichols)

Jackie (Noah Oppenheim)

Best Adapted Screenplay

Fences (August Wilson)

Silence (Jay Cocks)

Lion (Luke Davies)

Nocturnal Animals (Tom Ford)

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (Jean-Christophe Castelli)

Best Original Song

La La Land – Audition (The Fools Who Dream)

La La Land – City of Stars

Moana – We Know the Way

Sing Street – Go Now

Hidden Figures – Victory

Best Original Score

Arrival (Johann Johansson)

Nocturnal Animals (Abel Korzeniowski)

The Jungle Book (John Debney)

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Michael Giacchino)

Jackie (Mica Levi)

Best Visual Effects

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk

The Jungle Book

Arrival

A Monster Calls

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Best Costume Design

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Colleen Atwood)

Jackie (Madeline Fontaine)

Fences (Sharen Davis)

Silence (Sandy Powell)

La La Land (Mary Zophres)

Best Sound Mixing

La La Land

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk

Arrival

Passengers

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Best Sound Editing

La La Land

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Arrival

Passengers

The Jungle Book

Best Art Direction

La La Land (David Wasco)

Silence (Dante Ferretti)

Rules Don’t Apply (Jeannine Oppewall)

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (Mark Friedberg)

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Stuart Craig)

Best Makeup

Jackie

Nocturnal Animals

Star Trek Beyond

Silence

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Best Documentary Feature

Supersonic  (Mat Whitecross)

13th  (Ava DuVernay)

Gleason (Clay Tweel)

The Eagle Huntress (Otto Bell)

Best Foreign Language Feature

The Salesman (Iran)

Toni Erdmann (Germany)

Neruda (Chile)

From Afar (Venezuela)

Elle (France)

The Missing Hand - Movie Review - Indie Film

The Missing Hand is the rare movie that succeeds on almost every level, where each character, scene, music, and joke firing on all cylinders to make a film worth watching over and over again. An excellent script written by Daniel Harding really drags the viewer into every scene and makes you question what you would do yourself if you was in the position of the characters.

In terms of the visual elements of the film, there really isn't much that needs to be said but perfection. A few of the shots have a very distinctive symmetrical style. The use of framing and focus really improves the overall viewing experience of the film and gives it a very professional aesthetic.

The first thing that really gripped me was the original score that was composed and orchastrated by Jack Blume, it really captures the mood and essense of the film. The music is full of suspense and mystery. It's a sound that even Ennio Moricone would be proud of.

Excellent performances from all the cast that really suits the dark comedy narrative. For me the most stand out performance was from Meryl Griffiths who really seemed comfortable in the role she was playing which lead for a very natural and overall great performance.

The directing from Daniel Harding is excellent, it really makes for a smooth flowing film from start to finish because your eye is always looking at something.

Overall I am incredibly impressed with The Missing Hand and it definitely exceeded my expectations by a couple of miles. I'm looking forward to seeing what the future holds for 231/2 Productions.

The Jungle Book 2016 - Movie Review

Jon Favreau's The Jungle Book isn't just a captivating adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's classic children's novel, but has forever changed the way CGI and real world settings will be integrated in film. There's no question about it: The Jungle Book is one of the most beautiful movies to come out of the studio in years. The attention to detail painted on every computer generated animal is impossible to ignore and the effect is a captivating experience like no other.

For the first time in a movie like this, which attempts to blend CGI elements with an actor and physical setting, the computer generated aspects of the film aren't distracting. After the first ten minutes or so, it doesn't even feel like there are CGI characters.

Paired with an A-list group of actors who are perfectly cast as the animals they're voicing, The Jungle Book is an enthralling, illuminating experience that not only pays tribute to a great story, but manages to make it that much better.

The Jungle Book follows the "human-cub" Mowgli (Neel Sethi), who has been living in the jungle among a pack of wolves since he was a toddler. He loves his life in the forested world, endlessly running through the open area with his pack brothers and sisters. Despite that, he can't help but feel a sense of not belonging to their world.

Still, that doesn't stop his pack leader Akela (Giancarlo Esposito) from taking him in and protecting him like he was one of their own. Things change, however, when the vicious tiger Shere Khan (Idris Elba) decides that it's time to kill Mowgli once and for all, leading to the boy's immediate departure from the clan.

Alongside his most trusted friend and protector, a leopard named Bagheera (Ben Kingsley), Mowgli travels deeper into the jungle than he ever has before, informed he must forever leave and live with other humans in the neighboring village. A home, he's informed, that he was supposed to have lived in his entire life.

During his journey, he encounters new friends (like the bear Baloo, voiced by Bill Murray) and dangerous creatures (like the snake Kaa, voiced by Scarlett Johansson) that show him a side of the world he grew up in he never knew existed.

One of the biggest advantages the film has is its cast. To say that each actor perfectly suited their character and made the performance as believable as possible would be an understatement. Johansson, Murray, Elba and Christopher Walken (who plays the giant orangutan King Louie) breathe life into the movie that other actors may not have been able to capture, and part of that credit is rightfully deserved by director Jon Favreau.

Because so much of this movie is CGI, the voice acting cast was instrumental in making it as successful as it turned out to be. That means quite a bit of studio time, working with screens in front of them to nail the menacing or mischievous tone of their character.

Despite Chris Rock's claims that voice acting is the easiest job in the world, it can be difficult to connect with an animated character that you're not physically acting out, but there is nothing unbelievable about these performances.

Again, some of that comes back to just how realistic the CGI looks in the film. It's an aspect that can't be understated. The Jungle Book has redefined what CGI can do for a movie. In doing so, however, Favreau's Jungle Book is a much scarier adaptation than the previous animated Jungle Book from 1967. There are quite a few moments that get the heart pumping, and while you won't jump in your seat from any of the darker, violent scenes, there's definitely a sense that this movie wasn't made for children in the same way the former Disney cartoon film was.


The Jungle Book, while definitely still a children's movie, goes back and forth from providing the type of entertainment young kids (between the ages of four and nine) will appreciate and adding just the right amount of intensity in other scenes that adults will enjoy.

One other aspect to the film that deserves a big mention is Neel Sethi's performance. Sethi, who played the young Mowgli, is the only human in this movie and therefore carries a lot of the weight. He's the one that people are going to connect with and, as both the hero and a young child, he's the character you want to root for the most. That's a lot of responsibility and pressure for a young actor —€” Sethi was only 11 or 12 when the movie was being shot. He manages to not only portray the character extremely well, but even adds his own charming take.

Simply put, Sethi is downright adorable, talking animatedly in every scene he's in and using his exuberance for the role to his advantage during more physically demanding scenes. It's an even more impressive feat after acknowledging that Sethi would have been filming almost every scene by himself entirely, both in front of a green screen and on location.

In many ways, this was a movie filmed between Favreau and Sethi, with the voice acting cast's parts thrown in to support the young actor. Because Sethi is the only human being on screen, he's the person we naturally gravitate to and have an instant connection with. It's vital that he's someone we like and want to support. Sethi goes above and beyond expectations, and brings a much needed lightheartedness to the film.

In fact, it's their scenes together that stick out the most and it's when the film becomes the most fun. There's a sense of childlike wonderment between the two characters in all of their excursions, from floating down the river and singing to hiking through the forest and collecting vines for rope. While the entire movie focuses on the strange friendships that Mowgli has developed over the years, his scenes with Baloo are the only ones that feel like watching two buddies hang out. It's the only time that doesn't feel like Mowgli is in a dire situation and that's partly what makes it so enjoyable. There's no question that Sethi is a talented actor, and The Jungle Book will act as a launching pad for his career. It can't be said enough just how crucial his fantastic performance is in carrying the 90-minute feature.

The only issue the film faces is its decision to include two songs from the original 1967 version.
"The Bare Necessities" and "I Wanna Be Like You" both make appearances in the movie, and while they're done with a wink, they feel totally out of place both times, especially the latter. It's not a major issue with the movie, but it is noticeably distracting. In a movie like The Jungle Book, where one of the main goals is to ensure that nothing distracts from the heavily reliant CGI characters, it's the only time that the movie feels somewhat absurd. Murray makes the song work, but just barely. It doesn't seem entirely out of place that his character would start singing while floating down a river, but it's still unnecessary and that's the main issue with both tracks.

The film doesn't need the musical angle to make it more appealing. It was amusing, it was intense and it was emotional. If the film wasn't set up as a musical from the very beginning, or at least close to the beginning, it's difficult to inject a couple of three minute songs and expect the audience to not be confused by it. "I Wanna Be Like You" is an even more confusing addition for a couple of reasons. For one, the song isn't actually sung, but spoken. For another, Christopher Walken isn't the type of actor who can get away with seamlessly bringing a song in and running with it. He, and his character, are too awkward and the result is an embarrassing couple of minutes.

That said, The Jungle Book is a fun and extraordinary film. It may not be an instant classic, but its use of CGI technology is a major game changer that I hope the studio uses again. On that note, The Jungle Book is the type of film you're going to want to see in theaters: It's completely deserving of a top-quality screen for the best possible experience.

A good movie provides a couple of hours of entertainment, but a great one transports you from your seat into an entirely different world, wrapping you in its embrace and immersing you in a land full of fantastical beings. The Jungle Book isn't just a good movie, but a great one, and you won't want to leave the world Favreau built even long after the credits finish rolling.

Batman V Superman - Movie Review

A dark force has been unleashed in a new cinematic universe—an enemy of levity, a besieger of vulnerable psyches, a merciless wielder of advance technologies against which ordinary humans sit defenseless. And Zack Snyder is only the director of “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.” The other two guys are really downers.

This underdeveloped, overlong and stupendously dispiriting duel of unlikely antagonists is the first in a projected series of interconnected films based on DC Comics characters. Ben Affleck plays Bruce Wayne/Batman—he’s impressive, within the script’s limits, even though Christian Bale’s Caped Crusader in the Christopher Nolan trilogy was a formidable act to follow. The Clark Kent/Superman role is reprised by Henry Cavill, who is just as inexpressive as he was almost three years ago in the superviolent, ultraturgid “Man of Steel,” which was also directed by Mr. Snyder. The ending of that film and the beginning of the new one overlap. Gotham is again under attack from the cosmically evil General Zod, and Superman, in fighting him, causes vast collateral damage—to the city, and to Bruce Wayne’s enterprises and employees.

That provides the pretext for the conflict between two mythical figures. For Bruce, “Batman v Superman” becomes a tale of revenge. For Mr. Snyder and his writers, Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer, it’s a would-be dissertation on the nature of heroism—“The Incredibles” without the fun—and on two deeply flawed superheroes. Would-be as opposed to what is, because spasms of highfalutin philosophy, and howlingly pretentious dream sequences, serve only as the thinnest of veneers for incessant action in one of the most assaultive movies ever made. (I saw it on a big IMAX screen—there are not-so-big IMAX screens these days—that upped the assaults into virtual felonies.)

In the philosophical scheme of things, Superman is seen as a good guy in a time of terror—a suicide bombing links the movie’s sci-fi fantasy to current reality—but also a loose cannon, a unilateral interventionist and, when public opinion turns against him, an illegal immigrant. (Who knew that extraplanetary visitors needed green cards?) Batman, by contrast, turns into a brutal vigilante who brands his victims with a bat sign. (He’s an aging vigilante, as we’re meant to see when he takes on younger adversaries in a labored ballet of martial arts set in Africa.)

Yet the contrasts are blurred by the movie’s penchant for equal-opportunity pessimism—“We’re all criminals,” says Batman; “No one stays good in this world,” says Superman. (These are indeed dark times, but so was the Great Depression, and Hollywood in the 1930s gave us Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire along with violent mobsters.) And the conflict between them, far from seeming inevitable, feels exactly like what it is, an arbitrary notion for a big-budget extravaganza that contains trailers—disguised as disjointed action sequences—for sequels to come. Among the characters who surface is Diana Prince/Wonder Woman, played unwonderfully by the Israeli actress Gal Gadot.

The action gets blurry too, not from a deficit of energy—Mr. Snyder, a merchant of bleakness, is also a maestro of high-tech kinetics—but from a lack of variety. After a while everything looks the same, thanks in large part to the ugly blue-and-teal palette the filmmaker favors (the cinematographer was Larry Fong), and everything sounds the same, thanks entirely to a pitiless score, by Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL, that suggests platoons of percussionists high on magic mushrooms. The climactic battle between you-know-who is a slugfest, as inelegant as it is extended. Amy Adams is back as Lois Lane, though she doesn’t have much to do. Jesse Eisenberg has lots to do as the villainous Lex Luthor. This time Lex is conceived as a demented version of the Internet icon Mark Zuckerberg, whom Mr. Eisenberg played in “The Social Network,” but the dementia is more embarrassing than funny. (Oh, for the days of Gene Hackman’s exuberant evil.)

Honor bound as I am to avoid spoilers, I can tell you without fear of divulging too much that there’s a product placement toward the end for Turkish Airlines—an odd if not unseemly aberration in a production that supposedly cost a quarter billion dollars—and that a crucial, and preposterous, plot point turns on mother love.

High Rise - Movie Review

If you enjoy shots of dogs leaping to safety from flaming near-doom in disaster movies, steel your eyes. It’s no spoiler to say the mutt sizzles in this adaptation of J.G. Ballard’s 1975 novel from Kill List/Sightseers director Ben Wheatley. As a paw is spit-roasted, the point is well made: faced with extreme material for his first adaptation, biggest budget and biggest cast (not his only hapless hound, mind – RIP, Sightseers’ Poppy), Wheatley doesn’t flinch.

Wheatley and screenwriter/wife Amy Jump’s Ballard riff is unrulier than Crash, David Cronenberg’s take on Ballard’s other supposedly ‘unfilmable’ novel, also produced by Jeremy Thomas. But Wheatley and Jump pull off a similarly seamless author/filmmaker hybrid, honouring the novel while making it their own highly cinematic beast.

The result drew mixed festival reviews, but roll with its anarchic satirical punch and you’ve got rare meat: a Brit-film of singular vision, blackened wit and dog-toasting audacity, cooked with such brio that its flaws seem like acceptable casualties. As the dog cooks, we meet Tom Hiddleston’s Dr Robert Laing, a seemingly vacant neurologist reclining on a Brutalist tower-block balcony in mid-’70s London.

As placid as he seems, one of many clear mergers of the Ballard/Wheatley/Jump mindsets is established as the voiceover comments, “Now that so many residents were out of the way…” Hell is often other people in Wheatley/Jump’s films, from the singing Christians in Kill List to the fellow holidaymakers up for the chop in Sightseers. Here, the resentment is largely class-based, a point emphasised as we rewind three months and Dr Laing moves into the isolated tower’s 25th floor.

With his charm, looks, slippery personality and copious medicinal know-how as pass-keys, Laing floats between classes and floors. Just above him is Sienna Miller’s free spirit Charlotte Melville; down below, there’s arch-revolutionary documentary-maker Wilder (Luke Evans) and his class-strapped clan, pregnant wife Helen (Elisabeth Moss) and watchful son Toby (Louis Suc). Way up on top is the architect Anthony Royal (Jeremy Irons), who designed the tower as a “crucible for change”, a kind of “experiment”.

If Irons’ roles in Dead Ringers and M. Butterfly provide a roundabout link to Cronenberg, so does a med-school scene where the skin of a cadaver’s head is peeled away in a kind of metaphor for society’s thin surface.

The results of Royal’s experiment also recall the dabblings with sex parasites in Cronenberg’s tower-block ‘splatire’ Shivers, where orgiastic chaos bloomed. As power cuts and class-sparked clashes over swimming pools stoke rage in High-Rise, society’s lid blows and apocalyptic rioting erupts, with Che Guevara-loving Wilder its enthused advocate and Dr Laing our amoral eyes.

In Ballard’s spirit, Wheatley and Jump play out this scenario as a retro-futurist sci-fi allegory. Ballard was writing about the near-future in the mid-’70s: Wheatley and Jump smartly stick with a period they know well. The overflowing bin bags, broken bottles, nasty sideburns and swingers’ indulgences reek of late-’70s Britain, even before a familiar prime minister’s voice intones over the climax.

If that final nod is faintly on the nose, one or two performances also stumble. Whether it’s the effect of asking a large ensemble to evoke the chaos of a kids’ party ‘gone a bit Game of Thrones’ or not, a couple of comic turns overstate their grotesque case.


Yet the core cast are electric. Hiddleston is terrifically nonchalant (and quite a mover) in a role that links a Wheatley/Ballard theme: the psychosis behind British reserve. Miller makes bright work of Charlotte, Moss’ neglected wife is touching, the Oliver Reed-ish Evans is seedier than a ’70s ’tache and Irons oozes curdled aristocracy. And he gives good press-ups.

Wheatley and Jump’s flair for comic incongruity and deadpan dialogue is equally well pumped. Recalling the camping/killing collisions in Sightseers, weaponised tinned goods are deployed in an all-out supermarket civil war. A child scoffs cereal as he watches a man brutalise another over paint tins; as hell erupts, someone casually remarks, “There’s some very unhappy bunnies bouncing around.” That skewed sensibility extends to some fabulous surreal flourishes: horses and goats roam a top-floor garden paradise.

Even as the plot turns choppy, eye-watering marvels of artful detail keep its grip sharp. Mark Tildesley’s lavish production design ranges from mouldering fruit bowls to posh parties decadent enough to cause a French revolution. Indelible money shots include a kaleidoscope of death and a suicide plunge, while the music is practically an extra character. Clint Mansell’s deliciously jaunty, drunk-baroque score ingeniously offsets the darkness; equally startling is a lush ABBA cover by Bristol torch-noir titans Portishead.

As Portishead’s Beth Gibbons coos her ‘SOS’, the cry for help comes too late for the dog. But anyone who likes their cinema off-piste should ignore the sniffier reviews and give Wheatley’s call the chance it deserves: a good shot at some cult love.

10 Cloverfield Lane - Movie Review

It might have the C-word in the title, J.J. Abrams producing and a monster in its midst, but this is not Cloverfield 2. Anyone expecting/desiring a sequel to Matt Reeves' 2008 monster mash will feel disappointed at best, cheated at worse, so let's make that thunderously clear from the off. Rather, 10 Cloverfield Lane is, as Abrams puts it, a "spiritual successor" or "blood relative" set in the (shudder) "Cloververse” – a hint of overlap here, a pinch of DNA there.

In fact, so faint are the echoes, not everyone will be convinced that debut director Dan Trachtenberg's suspense-thriller is anything more than a standalone effort. Originally entitled Valencia, it doesn’t take a cynic to point out that slipping 'Cloverfield' into the title of this Bad Robot production can only boost box-office prospects.

What's not to be doubted is the effectiveness of this tense, claustrophobic three-hander. Gone is the setting of a New York teeming with an astonishingly designed kaiju, scuttling alien-arachnids and unpardonably attractive twenty somethings. Instead we have a remote farmhouse – the address of the title – located 40 miles from Lake Charles in Louisiana, though the action is primarily confined to an underground bunker.

Our way in is, who we meet as she packs her stuff to flee a relationship. So forceful is the car crash that she’s subsequently involved in that we, like her, are stunned when she awakens to find herself hooked to a drip in a bare, windowless room with breeze block walls. She’s also chained.

Michelle’s captor is Howard (John Goodman), slovenly clothed, salt ‘n’ pepper beard, routinely flexing his hands as anger and paranoia surge through his tremendous frame. “There’s been an attack, a big one… I’m not sure yet if it’s chemical or nuclear,” he informs Michelle, warning of a fallout that requires they stay underground for “one year, maybe two”. Is he speaking the truth?

The third player in this psychodrama, mellow, eager-to-please Emmet (The Newsroom’s John Gallagher Jr.), certainly thinks so. He supports Howard’s theory that the Southern Seaboard has been attacked, and offers testimony of an appalling flash, “like something you read in the Bible.”

If Cloverfield assaulted our eyes with seesawing, visceral, found-footage thrills, and our ears with the deafening roar of streaking jets and collapsing skyscrapers, 10 Cloverfield Lane is all about pregnant stillness and screaming silence. Trachtenberg is far more traditional in his filmmaking and suspense techniques, right down to the stabbing strings of Bear McCreary’s Bernard Herrmann-esque score, and here delivers a chilling chamber piece in which a bellowed word or a fist thumped down on a table can impact like the Statue Of Liberty’s head bouncing down a Manhattan street

The presence of Whiplash’s Damien Chazelle among the screenwriting credits speaks volumes: Goodman’s Howard is as terrifying as J.K. Simmons’ Fletcher. He might not stop at verbal and psychological abuse, either – 10 Cloverfield Lane burrows deep into horror territory, threatening, at times, to become Martyrs for the masses.

The atmosphere is one of ambiguity and distrust. At the top of the steps to a triple-locked door gleams a small window to the outside world, and through it can be spied two dead pigs, Frank and Mildred, their blood-blistered flesh seemingly lending credence to Howard’s ranting about Russia, North Korea, al-Qaeda, and extraterrestrials. But then how do you explain the Doomsday books on his shelves, or the very existence of this bunker, with its air-filtration unit and tidy living space kitted out with TV, DVDs, jukebox, fish tanks, plants, electrical stove and refrigerator? He is, as Emmet puts it, “a black belt in conspiracy theory”.

All three characters are strongly played by a cast that was allowed to act out the drama chronologically courtesy of the single setting, and each has a backstory that further ratchets the tension – Howard’s mentions of someone called Megan build into a particularly heart-stopping subplot.

But there is humour, too, with the trapped trio continuing to obey table manners in this most extraordinary of settings, and adapting their rhythms until they co-inhabit with something like harmony – movies viewed include Pretty In Pink and Cannibal Airlines. (The latter is a made-up title but Frank Marshall’s 1993 drama Alive is a close fit.)

Does the action ever unpick its padlocks and move above ground? And, if so, is there anything out there that more firmly locates Trachtenberg’s movie in the “Cloververse”? To answer that would be to do the script, with its incrementally-tightening chokehold, a terrible disservice. Although it’s fair to say that the suspicious, strong-minded and thoroughly resourceful Michelle has one eye forever on that outer door, the other on the keys swinging from Howard’s hip. It’s also fair to say that Winstead’s unflashy, deep-dive performance elicits more emotional investment than any of Cloverfield’s comely cut-outs.

It’ll be too slow-burn for some and others are sure to say it’s a Twilight Zone episode stretched over 104 minutes (to which we say: “And?”), but 10 Cloverfield Lane has enough suspense, shocks and scares to be a monster hit. Let’s hope so – someone needs to give Trachtenberg a wad of cash to go shoot Cannibal Airlines.

The Witch - Movie Review

It’s safe to say that writer/director Robert Eggers‘ feature debut, The Witch, giveth no shites about your genre expectations. The film is a powerful slow burn dripping in period detail, dialogue authenticity and atmospheric dread, and while it moves at its own pace the end result is like a Halloween-themed episode of Little House on the Prairie by way of Ben Wheatley’s Kill List.

The oldest daughter, Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy), is tasked with multiple chores and responsibilities, but when her baby brother is stolen during a game of peekaboo she finds herself under increasing suspicion by her God-fearing family. Accusations of witchery are lobbed her way by her fraternal twin siblings — who, let’s be honest, add to their pre-existing creepiness inherent in all twins by having conversations with their ominously named goat, Black Philip — and the familial tension continues to ratchet upwards as things go bump in the night and the isolated farm fails to deliver a bounty.

Eggers’ film, subtitled “A New England Folktale,” hits fast and early with the kidnapping/mulching of the youngest family member, but it settles down some as they decide to believe a lone wolf made off with the baby. Life goes on and all of that, but their loneliness and crop troubles quickly bring everyone — characters and viewers — back to the edge. The film’s design, from production to sound, is partly responsible for that as a score made of strings and choral voices works alongside crisply terrifying sound effects to immerse us in this dark new world. That same level of meticulous design and construction is evident in the house, costumes and conversations.

The dialogue adds immensely to that immersion, and Eggers has credited written period accounts with achieving that authenticity. “Did ye make some unholy bond with that goat?” asks William at one point, and it’s both amusingly on point horror-wise and frightening in its implications.

The film does take a minor misstep around its midpoint as the finger pointing grows out of control. Accusations of devilish intervention roll across the screen like a game of whack-a-witch as William reacts violently towards one child, then the next, and then back again without pause. It speaks to the conflict between knowledge and religious belief, where unexplained events could easily be blamed on or credited to supernatural design, and while the back and forth frustrates for a short while it ultimately adds to the uneasy atmosphere. Equally noticeable (and ultimately forgivable) is the film’s desire to build its mystery by intentional misdirection and flat-out avoidance of the truth.We’re made to wonder as to certain characters’ allegiance even though another present in the room should be able to reveal what’s happened.

The cast does strong work, from Ineson and Dickie on down to the twins, but it’s Taylor-Joy and Harvey Scrimshaw (as the family’s oldest boy child) who connect emotionally through powerful, fear-filled performances. Scrimshaw delivers with one scene in particular that sees his character speaking in tongues and terrified of what lies beyond the curtain of our world. Taylor-Joy has the tougher role of balancing her innocence in the face of increasing suspicion.

Make no mistake, The Witch is a horror film, but it’s as interested in the terrors we bring upon ourselves as it is the ones well out of our natural control. The dangers of blind faith, the trouble with interpretation, and the inability to accept the unknown as simply a temporary gap in our knowledge all combine to form a world where man continues to be his own worst enemy. Well, the witch in the woods still isn’t helping matters any either.

Goodnight Mommy - Movie Review

Like many of you I’ve been following the hype and reviews for the Austrian film Goodnight Mommy for months. When twins Lukas and Elias’ mother arrives home from an apparent cosmetic surgery operations they begin to have suspicions that this woman may not be their beloved mother. She’s cold, distant, and prone to violent rages which she takes out on the boys. Isolated by rolling fields of corn and farm houses, the boys are left to their own devices and set out to find the truth. But is it the truth they want?

The film opens with the boys, Lukas, and Elias, playing hide and seek in a giant cornfield and exploring the woods around the house. I immediately got a strong sense of texture from the first scene. Everything in this film has a distinct texture whether it’s the corn field swaying or the blinds in the home that are continuously being opened and shut. I wanted to reach out and touch everything. Once back home the boys run in to find their mother grotesquely bandaged from her surgery making their first encounter unsettling. The language barrier helps with the dread and overall ferocity that spews from Mother (who’s name is unknown) as she explains the new rules in the house. Complete silence, blinds closed at all times, no bringing things in from outside, etc.

Goodnight Mommy suffers from a misleading trailer. Everything that happens in the trailer happens in the first 20-25 minutes.The film is full of haunting imagery, namely the gigantic collection of hissing cockroaches the boys keep and follows a somewhat slow-burn structure which mainly consists of following Lukas and Elias around their giant house and endless trails. The build up does a fine job of inducing a sense of dread in the atmosphere. In a particular scene, Mother grabs Elias by the hair and forces him upstairs away from Lukas and forces him to say multiple times he will not talk to his brother anymore while Lukas bashes his fists into it.

As I mentioned before, Goodnight is highly texturized but that’s not the only interesting aesthetic too. Overall the theme of the film is isolation and this is extremely evident within the home. Despite the giant floor to ceiling glass doors/windows in every room, the house seems very clinical but what I found the most intriguing was the wall art. There are various pieces of artwork hanging up featuring blurred or distorted female figures. This plays heavily into the is she/isn’t she their real mother. I found that little nuance to be a nice touch.

The film is also wrought with disturbing imagery such as the fish tank of cockroaches, a dead cat, and images of torture. Let’s talk about that list bit for a moment. Once the boys decide to find out the truth it’s on like Donkey Kong between them and mommy dearest. I don’t want to give away too much because what occurs between the boys and Mother happens to be where the movie slides into predictability. However, I was genuinely disturbed by some sequences between them. It’s worth mentioning that the twins in this film are quite good child actors. They never grate on your nerves and because they are really brothers it almost feels like they aren’t acting at all when paired together and on their own.

But unfortunately, all the dread and suspense is undermined by the highly predictable ending. I was really annoyed with it honestly because I had enjoyed the film so much up to that point. This was a co-written and co-directed debut feature from Severin Fiala & Veronika Franz who’s only other works consist of a few shorts and a documentary. So perhaps I’m being too critical but the twist ending just really blew it for me. Mad props for filming on 35 mm but…ugh. I will say that this team has enormous potential so I do look forward to what they do next.

The Best Leonardo DiCaprio Memes

After the long overdue Oscar that Leonardo DiCaprio received at the 88th Academy Awards this Sunday. We have also witnessed the death of the Leonardo DiCaprio Oscar memes. So here are a few of my favorite creations.

Rest in Peace Leo Memes

Eddie The Eagle - Movie Review

It’s not to be taken too seriously, but Eddie The Eagle definitely succeeds as a silly, entertaining underdog story.

From Bad News Bears to Cool Runnings to The Mighty Ducks, it’s hard not to love an underdog sports story. Sure, they can occasionally be formulaic and predictable, but there’s always pleasure in cheering for David in a fight against Goliath, and there’s always tremendous potential for fun character work in like-minded films. It’s become a great cinematic tradition, and it’s one that director Dexter Fletcher’s Eddie The Eagle falls right in line with, mixing kooky period style with a ridiculous and fantastic tale of true passion and fortitude.

Inspired by the feel-good true story that emerged from the 1988 Winter Olympics, the film stars Taron Egerton as Eddie Edwards: an awkward young Englishman who, despite being largely uncoordinated and unskilled, wishes to do nothing in his life other than compete for a medal in the Olympic Games. Throughout his youth, he constantly searches for the sport in which he can actually compete – and has a revelation when he discovers the art of ski jumping (a sport that Great Britain hadn’t competed in for decades).

Leaving his entire world behind, Eddie travels to Germany to learn at an elite ski jumping training center – but being as old as he is, he’s constantly mocked and told that he doesn’t have a chance. That is, until he catches the eye of an American, retired, and consistently drunk former ski lumping champion named Bronson Peary (Hugh Jackman), who begrudgingly agrees to take Eddie under his wing and teach him how to compete on the global level.

Admittedly, from that plot description, you can probably predict each beat of Eddie The Eagle as it plays out, but what the film lacks in big surprises it makes up in miles of heart and really perfect style. It’s clear that Dexter Fletcher knew exactly what kind of movie he was making going into the project, as it functions as a wonderful throwback to the era of classic underdog sports movies – complete with a rich, synth-filled score from Matthew Margeson that simultaneously keeps you pumped for the action while winking at the silliness of its subject matter. You’ll run out of fingers and toes trying to count the number of overused sports-movie tropes that find their way into the story, but because it’s done with such knowing flair instead of sheer laziness, it all feels strangely refreshing and fun, instead of laborious.

It’s worth mentioning that the film also takes many liberties with the story of Eddie Edwards – to the point where most of the movie is basically fictionalized – but in this day and age, that tactic actually feels worth applauding. Cinemas are regularly filled with by-the-book biopics that have no interest in straying from the details of the true story (possibly due to fears of inaccuracy claims), but Eddie The Eagle rather brazenly defies this approach and fabricates some rather huge parts of the story (such as the existence of fictional coach Bronson Peary, for starters). While some may admonish the film for this fact, it’s actually really great to see filmmakers (including Dexter Fletcher, in addition to screenwriters Sean Macaulay and Simon Kelton) who understand the line between emotional truth and factual truth, and use it to their advantage by making a more compelling story from the source material. Eddie The Eagle might not get everything completely right, but there’s also no denying that the movie is a great reflection and representation of its central figure.

Of course, a lot of that spirit comes from the actual portrayal of Eddie, and in playing a role that is a complete 180-degree turn from his breakout performance in last year’s Kingsman: The Secret Service, Taron Egerton not only demonstrates great range, but also some very abnormal and fascinating charisma. Sporting a pair of glasses that take over half his face, and a prominent under bite that makes him look consistently confused, Eddie is an awkward guy and unconventional protagonist, but Egerton really makes you care about his success simply by selling his extreme passion and unwillingness to be put down by all the “No’s” that he has heard throughout his life. Add in the great chemistry that he shares with Hugh Jackman (who puts in a fun, engaging performance of his own), and you realize that Eddie The Eagle will be one of the films we look back on with extreme fondness as Egerton rises to greater prominence in the industry.

Looking back, the 1990s was a great era for family sports movies - with the release of not just the aforementioned Cool Runnings and The Mighty Ducks, but also The Sandlot, Rudy, and more – and Eddie The Eagle feels more in tradition with those films than anything we’ve seen in a while. It’s not to be taken too seriously, but it definitely succeeds as a silly, entertaining underdog story, so understand that going in, and you will have fun.

Alien: Covenant and The Predator Get New Release Dates

Not to be distracted by the small matter of the Oscars this weekend, studio Fox have been doing a spot of release-date reshuffling. And while the news is muted for X-Men spin-off Gambit, it's more positive for the return of two monster franchises. Alien: Covenant will now be with us sooner than we thought, while The Predator now has a firm date for his unleashing.

Unlike its predecssor Prometheus, which came out in December of 2012, Fox have now staked Ridley Scott's Alien: Covenant as a full-on summer tentpole, picthing it on August 4, 2017. That shows a good deal of confidence on Fox's part that a "proper" new Alien after the curveball of Prometheus is a big thing indeed. It also gets it safely out of the way of Star Wars: Episode VIII, with its only direct competition on its new date currently Pitch Perfect 3 and Blazing Samurai.

Shane Black's The Predator, meanwhile, opens on March 2, 2018, likely more-or-less kicking off that year's "summer" blockbuster season. It currently shares its slot with an as-yet unnamed Warner Bros. big-hitter: probably a DC superhero movie; possibly the Ezra Miller- starring The Flash (Aquaman is slated for July the same year).

Fox has also shifted Tim Burton's Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiars out of its packed December slot into a quieter berth on September 30 this year. Avoiding Rogue One and Assassin's Creed, it'll now face Peter Berg's oil rig disaster movie Deepwater Horizon.

Alien: Covenant stars Katherine Waterston, Michael Fassbender, Demián Bichir, Jussie Smollett, Carmen Ejogo and Danny McBride. It's set ten years after Prometheus, has proper Aliens in it, and has been confirmed by Ridley Scott as aiming for an R-rating: itself significant for an August blockbuster.

Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiars is adapted by Jane Goldman from Ransom Riggs’ novel, and finds Hugo’s Asa Butterfield discovering the ruined gothic institution once run by Eva Green. Samuel L. Jackson, Judi Dench and Allison Janney are some of the inmates who never left...

And we don't know much about The Predator yet, but we're very excited.

Anomalisa - Movie Review

There's everything else happening in America cinema, and then there's whatever Charlie Kaufman is up to.

Ever since 1999's "Being John Malkovich," he has been on a short list of American screenwriters whose work is so original that he must be thought of as an auteur, even though film is supposedly a director's medium. Formidable filmmakers have adapted his scripts, including Spike Jonze("Malkovich" and "Adaptation") and Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "Human Nature"), but however assured the results, they were still unmistakably Charlie Kaufman movies, speaking their own alternately down-to-earth and elevated language.

Kaufman's mix of mordant humor, broad slapstick, self-aware storytelling devices, and images and language drawn from psychoanalysis, poetry and dreams coalesced even more strongly in his directorial debut, "Synecdoche, New York," about a playwright spending years (or a lifetime?) rehearsing and rewriting a massive production that was about his life but seemed indistinguishable from it. The undercurrents of wonder and despair ran deeper there than in any other Kaufman story, even "Eternal Sunshine."

They course throughout "Anomalisa" as well. The film could be described as a midlife crisis drama with puppets, about a depressed corporate efficiency expert (voiced by David Thewlis) who hears every voice, male or female, as the same voice (Tom Noonan's), and who becomes infatuated with a shy young woman (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who is attending his seminar in Cincinnati, Ohio. "Anomalisa" is based on an "audio play" by Kaufman. It was originally presented as part of a series of such plays, in collaboration with Joel and Ethan Coen and composer Carter Burwell, who has scored movies by both directors, including this one. The actors performed their lines while Burwell conducted a live score and sound effects artists provided background noises. Kaufman co-directed this film version with stop-motion animator Duke Johnson, whose work includes the "Community" episode "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas." It puts a "visual track" to Kaufman's audio play. The puppets are physically recognizable as "puppets," down to the segmented lines of their "face plates." But they move so realistically and speak so naturalistically (even when they're skipping across the tops of desks, as in the image at the top of this page) that there are times when you may forget that they're not people.

The puppet characters in most other films are more sprightly. They exist mainly to amuse. The characters in "Anomalisa" unsettle. Their plight makes you think about 21st century loneliness, despair and alienation— subjects that would be unpalatable if Kaufman didn't write his characters so compassionately and with such dry humor. Kaufman and Johnson shoot the characters in a carefully considered way, not cutting much, just sort of letting them sit there, and be. There are a few stealthy "long takes" in this film that would be much praised if they appeared in a live-action feature—sequences where the filmmakers simply follow characters as they traverse levels of the hotel, or have sex in a slab-like bed.

It might sound strange to say, but this puppet movie gives you a more accurate sense of what it's like to spend a few days in a nice hotel in a city of bad memories than most live-action films ever do—not that that's necessarily the kind of description that will make people want to rush out and see "Anomalisa." Like so many Kaufman characters, the ones in this movie are struggling, stumbling even, towards what might be a mirage of happiness, while battling both their own social conditioning and pathologies and the bland indifference of the world around them—a world that includes billions of other people who all think they are the stars of their own life-movies, and at times seem deeply frustrated by the fact that they haven't experienced one of those transformative moments that tell moviegoers, "Everything is going to be fine for this character now, don't worry."

Thewlis' Michael Stone is clearly unhappy with his work, his marriage, even his child. He seems disconnected from himself and the world. Not much happens to him in the plot sense. His plane touches down in Cincinnati. He settles into the hotel and orders room service while pacing and smoking a cigarette. He impulsively invites an old flame out for a drink hoping to get lucky, oblivious to the fact that he hurt her so terribly that it's painful for her to be in the same room with him.

Then he becomes smitten with a guest at the conference, a young woman who wears her hair to one side to hide a scar on her face. Her name is Lisa (Leigh), and she's the only character in the film who has her own voice (everyone else is voiced by Tom Noonan, remember). It's love at first sight—or Michael thinks it is. He seems to view Lisa as a redemptive figure, somebody who will pull him out of his existential malaise. But by that point we've spent enough time with Michael to know that he's not the best judge of what he needs. In fact his judgment is consistently terrible, and in typically Kaufman-esque fashion, we move from feeling for Michael and rooting for him to be happy to wondering if he's got some sort of debilitating emotional or mental condition (beyond the titular disorder). Then we progress into thinking about ourselves as much as Michael, contemplating our own fears, weaknesses, blind spots, and repetitive behaviors in relation to a world that barely seems to notice us.

For all its visual audacity and honest feeling, "Anomalisa" is a modest, even slight work, aesthetically sealed off from the same reality it engages. It ends a bit abruptly, just when it seemed to be ramping up towards a more definitive statement of some kind, and the general outlines of Michael's story aren't new. (Middle-Aged, Upper Middle-Class Male Grappling with Despair is pretty much a genre by this point.) But there's so much beauty and sadness in it, and so many exquisitely conceived scenes (including an impromptu musical performance that ranks with Kaufman's greatest moments), that it would be miserly to underrate it. Whether you leave the film ecstatically impressed, indifferent or disappointed, you will know you've seen something unique. Too many movies speak in a boringly typical storytelling voice. This one speaks in a voice as singular as Lisa's.

Swiss Army Man - Movie Review - Sundance 2016

"Swiss Army Man" is a comedic action-drama that stars Paul Dano as a lonely guy who, while sailing one day, gets swept up in a storm in the Pacific Ocean and is washed ashore on a deserted island. Daniel Radcliffe is the dead body that washes up at the moment when Dano's character, Hank, is about to commit suicide.

We're not even close to the weird part yet.

Directed by Daniels (Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert), who are best known for their music videos and commercial work, the duo have created for their feature-length debut a movie that highlights what it's like to be a recluse and not taking chances in life — a topic not uncommon to Sundance Film Festival entrants. The story plays out in a fashion that's funny, touching, but most importantly, original.

Let's take the film's opening 10 minutes, for example.

After he comes across the dead body, Hank gives this touching speech on how his hopes have been dashed that it isn't a live person. He's lonely, and desperate for human contact. But as he opens up in this revealing moment, the dead body passes gas.

It's funny; Hank even finds it amusing, but the body does it again. Even as Hank prepares to try suicide again, the body continues to pass gas.

The body then gets pulled into the current and moves further into the water — because of its relentless flatulence. Eventually, Hank sits on top of the body and floats it like a jet ski off the island. The film score is triumphant. Hank is cheering as he moves further away from the island. Is this all a dream?

That's a question you'll be asking yourself often as the body doesn't just use its biological function to help Hank out of his predicament, but as Hank continues to search for civilization the body turns into a multipurpose tool. The body chops wood with its arms, can start fires with its fingers, is a source of hydration by spewing water from its mouth — which Hank drinks.

Importantly, over time, the dead body begins to talk. Manny (the body's name) is curious about everything and Hank is happy to have someone to share his life with. Hank talks about what he wants to do when he returns home to reunite with his love, Sarah (Mary Elizabeth Winstead).

Hank and Manny build little moments from Hank's memory with sticks, brush, and trash found in the woods. But there are moments where Hank is too shy to go through with talking to Sarah, and tries to make Manny understand that doing almost anything instinctively will make a person look weird. "Swiss Army Man" is a look into the side of ourselves that's too weird to be revealed in public. But, what the Daniels show here, is that the eccentricities in us that we hide may, in fact, be the best version of ourselves. The Daniels just chose to drive home that point by creating a silly film with A-listers in it.

And that's the best part of this movie. Because the Daniels were able to land top-shelf talent like Dano and Radcliffe in their gonzo movie, it makes your chances of seeing "Swiss Army Man" outside of the film-festival circuit that much greater. So get ready.

Review of Bone Tomahawk

A modern twist on the Western Genre by up and coming director S. Craig Zahler could play a vital role in reviving the seemingly dead genre.

Westerns that were popular in the 60s such as Sergio Leone's famous dollars trilogy have seen their time as western movies popularity slowed down in the 70s and 80s, the genre lay in dormant for many years. Could Bone Tomahawk be the movie to bring the genre back to it's former glory?
S. Craig Zahler's creation is very far from the traditional western, featuring an incredible cast such as Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox and an outstanding performance from Richard Jenkins, I was specifically impressed with Richard Jenkins' performance as his character Chicory because prior to Bone Tomahawk I had only seen Richard performing in Step Brothers, and seeing him take on a very serious role in this movie blew me away. Possibly the most impressive of the casting in the movie was in the form of the 80s and 90s legend Kurt Russell, seeing him come to the western genre was outstanding to see and his role as Sheriff Franklin Hunt is honestly the best of all the Kurt Russell performances that I have seen, since his roles in the 80s in iconic movies such as Big Trouble in Little China, The Thing and Escape from New York, I'm happy to see that he has developed into one of the best actors in Hollywood and his performance in Bone Tomahawk is probably the actors best and will probably be a key turning point in the roles he will play in the future as we've now seen a new side to him.
For all you fans of guts and gore Bone Tomahawk is the one for you, with some of the most cringe-worthy scenes of violence I have ever seen and it really does give the western genre a postmodern twist.
Overall I think that S. Craig Zahler is one of the up and coming directors of Hollywood that everyone needs to keep their eyes on and I look forward to seeing what he has in store for us in years to come. Overall I would rate this film 8.5/10 and would definitely recommend it to anyone.