Film Review 173 – Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace

Watched: 3rd May 2024

Rating: 3/5 stars

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   Yes, it’s not a very good film, but it’s also weirdly so entrancing. I think it’s a massive case of style over substance – the CGI is visually incredibly impressive, for the time, but what I find most beguiling is the physical sets. Naboo is gloriously lush, and that’s to say nothing of Padmé’s wardrobe. Honestly, I think a whole star in this rating just comes from how well-dressed Natalie Portman is every time she’s on my screen, and I don’t even blame her acting skills for how stuffy the character is. The Neimoidians are a bit sus nowadays, yes, but there is just something so, so, so slay about how ludicrous Nute Gunray is, the camp little diva. Overall, The Phantom Menace suffers from being so breakneck that it leaves little time to generate emotions, and is just fundamentally missing a soul – but the trappings of the body certainly look good.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 12th May 2024: https://boxd.it/6oVgcZ

Film Review 162 – Dune: Part Two

Watched: 8th March 2024

Rating: 5/5 stars

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   The spectacle of watching this in IMAX format was frankly incomparable. I watched the first one in a normal cinema when it came out, and still found myself blown away by the effects and sounds – but last night took the biscuit. Dune 2 is nearly three hours’ worth of unrelenting spectacle, a tour-de-force that ducks and weaves, charges and feints, pushes through everything in its path without ever losing a single second of its own momentum. I hate sand as well, but it’s never looked so good on the silver screen, those wide shots of desolate dunes (see what I did there) haunting in their beauty beneath the pre-dawn sky, or else the blistering open desert at high noon, where earth and sky seem to melt into one. And then you contrast this with Giedi Prime, the unsettling glamour of its fighting pits, everything in a monochromatic, otherworldly glow that only highlights the inhumanity of its inhabitants, their almost-human faces and expressions. Dune 2 is a feast for not just the eyes, but all the senses.

   What of its story though? A problem I found with the initial Dune, that it sacrificed some of its heart in order to build its world (a necessary evil, to be sure), is all but gone in its sequel. Timothée Chalamet’s descent from hero to anti-hero, as Paul Atreides begins to resign himself to the destiny he has long tried to resist, is sobering to watch, but what is equally as gripping is the effect it has on his relationship with Chani – and how Zendaya captures the character’s natural sharpness and softness, the love she has for Paul tempered with the fear she has of him becoming someone unrecognisable. Meanwhile you have Rebecca Ferguson giving another scintillating turn as Lady Jessica, all notions of Bene Gesserit planning and plotting cranked up to 100 as she endeavours to make a messiah of her son. Dune is a space opera whose story rests not on grand, intrinsic moral notions of good versus evil, but instead on the dynamics of power, family, prophecy and truth. Is Paul really the long-awaited saviour? Does that even matter, when so many around him – and he himself – believe it? This is a parable against the dangers of extremism, of religious fervour and how imperialism do nothing except to decimate cultures with centuries of history. Watching Zendaya standing alone – quite literally – against this oncoming storm is almost sad, though I can’t wait to see how it turns out in Dune Messiah.

   Likewise, now that the story is fully on its way, the closing chapter of this trilogy has a lot to live up to. Florence Pugh hints at moments of Irulan’s iron will, but I’m still waiting to see her blade fully brandished. Likewise, if I could ask for something of this film, it would have been slightly more of the imperial court, slightly more of the Bene Gesserit. When you’re adapting something so dense, changes are necessary though, and Denis Villeneuve shows that his hands are more than capable at holding this delicate balance.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 21st March 2024: https://boxd.it/60pvWj

Film Review 152 – The Matrix (Re-watch)

Watched: 20th January 2024

Rating: 4/5 stars

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 Every time I watch The Matrix I enjoy it more, mainly for the philosophical questions it poses and quandaries it analyses rather than, say, the romance between Neo and Trinity, which I will always consider to feel forced (say what you like about the sequels, but it feels a lot more realistic in them than here). Nevertheless, you can’t deny that it still looks amazing nearly twenty-five years later. Indelibly chic, coolness personified, ice-cold and hurtling through the story while holding on for dear life. One thing that has always bugged me about it is Keanu Reeves’s acting, especially after viewing the other things in the series and seeing how expressive he gets to be in them – but now I feel like it’s a stylistic choice. In fact, you don’t really see anyone that passionate in this film…except, perhaps, Tank, who also happens to be one of only two naturally-born humans on the Nebuchadnezzar. Throughout everything there is this sense of detachment, a splinter not just in the mind but in socialisation too, and I’m starting to forgive the cast for acting that way after spending most of their lives hooked up to machines, imprisoned in their own brains in a world that cares very little for them.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 28th January 2024: https://boxd.it/5E4Hjt

Film Review 134 – The Creator

Watched: 27th September 2023

Rating: 2/5 stars

tl;dr – the collective groan that came up when this was revealed as the secret screening…I giggled

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   The Creator wants so badly to be the first film of its kind without ever stopping to consider that a) it is not the first film of its kind, and b) other films have done it a hell of a lot better. There are some interesting ideas and concepts here, but they are lost in the execution of what is, no matter how impressive some of its visuals may be, a pretty bog standard sci-fi action flick. I also disliked the fact that the film simultaneously had a huge reliance on exposition while also doing very little to actually inform us of the backstory. Where was the Akira-esque city exactly? It looked good, but the whole time I was questioning how Joshua and Alphie managed to sneak in (and get hoodies in the process). And then Los Angeles went from a ground zero wasteland to another glittering metropolis – and they managed to sneak past security again and even buy tickets? For a space shuttle?? And no one had any questions about these two people very conspicuously trying to hide their appearances? The film crams in a lot of meditations on the nature of AI versus ‘real’ humanity, and does its hardest to show that robots can be Buddhist monks too, but it just skips over too many of the essential plot infrastructure to make sure the ride isn’t bumpy. I did enjoy a lot of the visuals though, especially the NOMAD scenes (thanks Code Geass).

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 25th October 2023: https://boxd.it/4Uj13f

Film Review 125 – Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone

Watched: 7th August 2023

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

tl;dr – Ramiel on the red carpet at the Met Gala…I want to see it

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   The first Evangelion remake benefits and suffers massively from being a remake. Like let’s be honest. When the original is such a classic, so ingrained in the collective psyche, can re-entering that world ever truly invoke the magic of the first time? I think it’s pretty damn difficult to do, if not impossible. So while 1.0 can hurtle along at breakneck speed, there’s also something that holds it back. It’s not that it’s unwatchable without having seen the series before (far from it, in fact, it’s probably easier to keep track of its threads as a result), but it just feels so incomplete. Visually and technically, it’s stunning, certainly more so than the original, but it never quite forces itself to try and penetrate to the same emotional depths. Again, I understand that it’s shorter, and I understand that it’s trying to do something different, and I understand that comparisons just rob joy – but it’s just an observation. If you watched without having seen the series, I think you’d still have a good time. You’d still have questions about everything, you’d still be awed by the production values, you’d still feel like you’d watched a pretty well-done movie. I just prefer mine a bit more old-fashioned.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 31st August 2023: https://boxd.it/4F2pYl

Book Review 32 – The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu

Read: 1st January 2023 – 9th January 2023

Rating: 3/5 stars

tl;dr – Thank God I didn’t study physics at school because this book really just drove home how much I don’t understand it lmao

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   Giving The Three-Body Problem only three stars, even if out of five, almost feels like I’m being harsh. It’s been on my to-read list since I first heard of it winning the Hugo Award almost a decade ago now (gosh, way to make myself feel old), and I cannot deny that I found its plot fascinating. It felt like a really unique way of unravelling the mysteries of the story layer by layer, never giving away enough to make us feel like we could stop reading but never denying us too much to make us fed up. If Liu Cixin is good at one thing, it’s dangling a carrot before his reader’s nose, but he also excels in his incorporation of science into literature. Even if I found some of the concepts difficult to comprehend, coming from a decidedly unscientific background, I found his explanations of them mostly well done, and the way they are both driven by and propel the plot forward is certainly executed with a masterly hand. Not just the titular problem, to be sure – this is a book where science reigns supreme, and Cixin’s knowledge is evident for any reader to see.

   Because of this, despite Cixin’s claims in my edition’s epilogue that science’s stories are infinitely more ‘profound, thrilling, strange’ (insert adjective here) than those related in literature, I also found that The Three-Body Problem, from a technical perspective, suffers from another problem – it is incredibly pedestrian. Its characters are two, if not even just one, dimensional, its plot is full of happy contrived coincidences, its dialogue often reads like characters reading out passages from a physics textbook on x equation or y formula. Even though I really enjoyed this book, I feel like I enjoyed finding out the mystery more so than the mystery itself, if that makes sense – what can I say, I love a challenge. I was tempted to give it four stars, but I honestly think, comparing other books I’ve read and why I’ve given them four stars, that I just can’t do the same for this. Don’t get me wrong, there are certainly some nice lines of prose that I’ve noted down for my own collection of book quotes, and I would say that some characters, particularly Ye Wenjie, go through a dramatically acceptable arc of development, but it’s not enough. The Three-Body Problem cannot escape the rational view of the universe which so defines it, but even so, it’s such a fascinating story that it was still a lot of fun to read.

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Originally posted on Goodreads on 21st January 2023: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3315473799

Film Review 70 – Avatar: The Way of Water

Watched: 23rd December 2022

Rating: 4/5 stars

tl;dr – I love Free Willy in outer space

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   I might have missed it with the first one (in my defence, I didn’t go to the cinema a lot when I was younger), but seeing an Avatar film in 3D, as God intended, is definitely a whole new kind of cinematic experience. The first one, even when viewed now, still holds up well for all the advances in CGI and related technologies that have been developed in the past decade, but The Way of Water somehow pushes things even further. The uncanny valley that existed in some previous avatars (cough, Grace’s, cough) is completely gone in this one – instead we have a visual universe that feels so realistic it’s as if it were just filmed in reality. And the fact that so much of it is underwater as well is, frankly, an incredible achievement. Whatever else one can say about this film, hats must be taken off again for Mr Cameron’s unrelenting drive to push the technical boundaries of what we consider cinema, and his vision that is nothing if not singular in its desire to consistently wow his audience.

   Now, let’s forget about the visuals – how does the rest of the film stand-up? Much of what made the first Avatar strong and weak is present here as well. The story, somehow even more overtly environmentalist, features yet again character archetypes that we all know well. But what perhaps pushes it a little bit higher than the first film is that we are returning to some of these characters, rather than seeing them for the first time around. Quaritch’s resurrection as an Avatar-clone having to deal with the fallout of his own death, and also the presence of his former self’s biological child, adds an unexpected shade to our returning villain, one that doesn’t quite break the edges of his sharpness, but does, in certain moments, certainly blunt them. The new cast, be it Jake and Neytiri’s children or members of the Metkayina clan, also manage to make their characters as likeable/enjoyable viewing as the cast the first time around did. Whatever one can say about Cameron’s approach to these films, even if they do follow a tried-and-tested thematic path, it’s done so well, with such clear love for the characters and their emotional arcs, that it’s hard to look down on it, even if it does film like stuff we’ve seen plenty of times before. Where the first one felt like a story invented to detail an already-created world, The Way of Water feels like it has massively benefitted from the thirteen-year gap between the films to hone and sharpen its story, and if the aim was to create a great film, then I think Cameron has done a pretty good job, mostly.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 29th December 2022: https://boxd.it/3znl81

Film Review 69 – Avatar

Watched: 21st December 2022

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

tl;dr – imagine changing your whole species in order to get a shag…fair play tbh

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   I’ve somehow managed to go thirteen years without ever actually seeing Avatar. Not even like a little bit of it on the TV here and there – I genuinely had not ever seen a clip of it before Wednesday night. Was the highest grossing film of all time worth the wait? Well, when that is your legacy, it’s always going to be a bit difficult to live up to expectations, but as far as cinema goes, Avatar (even when not in 3D (somehow when it came back out in cinemas for like a whole two weeks I STILL managed to miss it)) is a pretty fun watch.

   I can see why some people call it formulaic. The story, while definitely able to reach some emotional high points, is pretty standard fare with the usual sci-fi/adventure archetypes – the compassionate scientist, the noble savage wild woman, the evil soldier, and at the heart of it all, our plucky protagonist who starts off a bit of a cocky asshole but morphs into everyone’s favourite hero by the end. It does often feel like the story was tacked on to the setting as an afterthought, but it’s not wholly empty – Stephen Lang is a villain you love to hate, and Zoe Saldaña’s ability to emote through motion-capture is surprisingly good, I have to say. Let’s face it, the main USP for Avatar was its graphics, and even when watching in lowly 2D, it’s still an absolutely stunning viewing experience. Pandora feels like one of the most fleshed-out environments I’ve ever seen in a film, and the richness of its details, the lushness of its colours, is frankly enchanting. The story, perhaps, doesn’t necessarily elevate it, but it does mean the film doesn’t just rely on visuals, and the end result is a Cameron offering that, while not among his best, is definitely unique.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 29th December 2022: https://boxd.it/3yTcXf

Film Review 53 – E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial

Watched: 3rd September 2022

Rating: 4/5 stars

tl;dr – can’t believe they copied the bike scenes from Stranger Things???

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   I genuinely cannot remember the last time I watched E. T. Easily twenty year ago, at least. Which feels absolutely horrifying to recognise because saying ‘ten years ago’ was bad enough, but two and a half decades just feels ridiculous. Anyway. It’s actually a surprisingly good film, like I know everyone talks about it as one of the great films of the 80s, but I always take such claims with a pinch of salt, because people nowadays might say that something like Avengers Endgame is one of the greatest films of all time and well… But E. T. manages, I think, to find that sweet spot between being commercially viable, emotionally fulfilling, and intellectually satisfying. For a family film there is a lot of subtext in it about not belonging, about the state of 80s urban society, but it’s superficially also engaging enough that, even though it’s no genius juggernaut, it still feels like more than just a film made to start a franchise or sell merchandise. But I think the best thing about the film is the earnestness of its performances, and hats go off to Henry Thomas and Drew Barrymore (and yes, Robert MacNaughton too) for being so emotive that they make me care so much about an animatronic wee alien – but more on that in a second.

   Anyway, to sum it up, for an 80s mega blockbuster whose main intention is to pander to the market, I do think E. T. has a suitable soul. Even the wee guy himself still looks fairly decent 40 years later – CGI would probably have not done anywhere as nearly a good job in making me care about him (he’s no Paddington), and the fact that the child actors are able to actually interact with E. T. as a result of him being real, like I said above, really helps to stop the movie from becoming maudlin, and have its emotional moments feel genuine. I’m actually quite surprised that I still liked the movie as much as I probably liked it as a wee boy – go Spielberg!

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Originally posted on Letterboxd on 17th September 2022: https://boxd.it/3bWDW3

Film Review 52 – Nope

Watched: 31st August 2022

Rating: 4/5 stars

tl;dr – Keke Palmer you will always be famous

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*Note – spoilers ahead*

   Nope does feel like two different films. The first half – which is where I covered my eyes most of the time – is quite an effective horror story, although part of me feels that, now I’ve at least seen it, I probably wouldn’t be quite as scared the next time. That’s a good thing, by the way, since no one wants to watch a film through their fingers the whole way through, but it doesn’t mean that the film isn’t unsettling. It’s never as gory nor so unrelentingly tense as Get Out, but Nope is going for a different kind of horror, I feel, and it ultimately succeeds in achieving that. It’s unnerving in flashes, as brief as the glimpses of Jean Jacket when we’re just getting introduced to them, but it never tries to outright terrify – although the Gordy sequence does come fairly close, I have to say.

   In the last half of the film, though, it seems to kind of shift away from being a horror into more of a…I’m not quite sure. Sci-fi western is how I would best sum it up, though the tonal dissonance doesn’t feel badly done. It’s a bit of a pivot, yes, but it suits the mood of the film, given that it’s a flirtation with so many different genres (I can’t remember the last time I laughed so much at a ‘horror’ film). It also means that we get to see its characters do more than just screaming and running around for two hours, and when Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer are your two main stars of the show, that can only be a good thing. Both are incredible, Kaluuya absolutely as good as he was in Get Out, but I honestly would defy anyone to say that Palmer is anything short of amazing. She’s funny, she’s witty, she’s terrified, she’s brave, she’s determined, she’s human. The final sequence in particular with her is one of the best endings to a film I’ve seen all year at the pictures, and that Akira tribute on the motorcycle? I literally gasped in the cinema when I saw it on the screen. Nope is another resounding success from Jordan Peele, and it gives me confidence that at least one current Hollywood director with the ability to interest large audiences is continuing to make films that defy our expectations, that examine themes in ways you weren’t anticipating, that just genuinely feel like accessible, yet intelligent, movies. Can’t wait to see what he does next, as long as it’s not too scary, of course.

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Originally posted on Letterboxd 17th September 2022: https://boxd.it/3bviZB