tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-311764702024-02-19T14:02:37.641+00:00Delicious BloggingIn which a fellow blogs. May not actually be delicious, I've never tried eating it.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.comBlogger246125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-4958396732712786172023-09-18T21:02:00.005+01:002023-09-18T21:02:45.943+01:00Tone and melody<p> So Sincere Engineer's new album's out later this week, Blink-182 have just announced a new album for next month to stand alongside new albums from Metric, the Menzingers and a reformed Gaslight Anthem, and I've just discovered that Public Service Broadcasting's new album came out like two weeks ago.</p><p><br /></p><p>Albums!<br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-55447895935445047912023-08-21T19:38:00.003+01:002023-08-21T19:38:14.300+01:00Good news, everyone<p> This week's episode of <i>Futurama</i> has, I feel, a strong shout at being the best one ever.</p><p>They're just showing off at this point, aren't they? "Oh, cancelled again, is it? We'll just come back in ten years and somehow be even better."<br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-61816111754526550592022-07-31T23:54:00.001+01:002022-07-31T23:54:06.862+01:00The eternal regret<p> I didn't go to see <i>Eternals</i> in the cinema because a) it didn't get great reviews and b) it didn't look especially good from the trailer. I just watched it on Disney+ and loved it! What the hell, past me? That would've been great to see on a big screen.<br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-89534814747783193592022-02-14T15:46:00.005+00:002022-02-14T15:46:31.759+00:00The televisual arts<p> The last two episodes in a row of <i>Attack on Titan</i> have caused me to involuntarily yelp "what the <i>fuck</i>" at certain points.</p><p>What a show that is.<br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-58892779297705429512022-02-07T19:56:00.006+00:002022-02-07T19:56:45.617+00:00The cinematic arts<p> I think this year so far has been the best I've ever had for cinema trips. Since 2022 started, I've ventured to the pictures five times (<i>The Matrix Resurrections</i>, <i>Licorice Pizza</i>, <i>Nightmare Alley</i>, <i>The Tragedy of Macbeth</i> and <i>Belle</i>) and the quality has ranged exclusively from "very good" to "absolutely excellent". For the record, <i>Macbeth</i> is the current leader of the pack, but <i>Nightmare Alley</i> isn't far behind.</p><p>Next two trips are Spielberg's <i>West Side Story</i> and <i>The Green Knight</i>, so hopefully they'll keep the side up. Reviews certainly seem to suggest that's the case.</p><p>It's also nice to see that <i>Belle</i> has broken Mamoru Hosoda's pattern of "excellent film followed by one that's just decent". (Sorry, <i>Summer Wars</i> and <i>The Boy and the Beast</i>, but ya just don't got it, kids.) Also also, <i>Belle</i>'s soundtrack is so good I bought it on iTunes the second I got home (and am listening to it right now). Can't remember the last time I did that. <i>Baby Driver</i> maybe?</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/atPenPe6IhA" width="320" youtube-src-id="atPenPe6IhA"></iframe></div><br /><p><br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-40605277669786640912022-01-13T20:35:00.006+00:002022-01-13T20:36:21.232+00:00My top ten films of 2021<p> It should be noted that like three days into 2022 I went to see <i>The Matrix Resurrections</i> and loved it, so that should be in here somewhere, probably around position 5 or 6. However, I'd already written half of this, so shrug emoji.</p><span><a name='more'></a></span><p>
</p><p class="MsoNormal">10. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Godzilla vs. Kong </i>(dir.
Adam Wingard)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Sometimes only a big dumb movie will do and they do not get
much bigger or dumber than Big Reptile Punches Big Gorilla.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Happily, and unlike the 2014 <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Godzilla</i> that kicked this series off
(haven’t seen <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">King of the Monsters</i>),
this is a film that knows it’s a stupid blockbuster and leans right on into its
stupidity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s also properly gorgeous
to look at, with saturated colours and genuinely inventive vistas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yes, there are several scenes where a big
reptile and a big gorilla punch each other.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Sorted.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">9. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Barb & Star Go
to Vista Del Mar</i> (dir. Josh Greenbaum)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The prevalence of encouraging improvisation and riffing in
American comedies for the last fifteen years or so means that it’s increasingly
hard to find a comedy film that actually has properly structured jokes and
elaborate visual gags.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s weird but
heartening that Kristen Wiig, one of the most notable of the riff-heavy gang,
has co-written and starred in a proper, elaborate comedy with outlandish sight
gags, structured payoffs and musical numbers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The film feels closest in spirit to Mike Myers’ 1990s peak (helped by
the fact that Wiig both plays one of the heroes and the Bond-esque villain in
the finest <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Austin Powers</i> style), as
two middle-aged best friends go on their first ever holiday to the titular
Florida resort and accidentally foil an evil plan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone’s firing on all cylinders, but
despite Wiig’s sterling double-duty the MVP is Jamie Dornan, of all people,
throwing himself into increasingly ridiculous scenarios until you find him
serenading an animatronic seagull.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Delightful.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">8. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Fear Street: Part
Three – 1666</i> (dir. Leigh Janiak)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have little to no interest in slasher movies, but the high
concept of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Fear Street</i> intrigued
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Loosely based on a series by the
preposterously prolific RL Stine, it launched on Netflix as a back-to-back
trilogy, each part set in a different era, with each film released a week
apart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(It was originally intended for
cinema release, each film launching in successive months, but the pandemic put
paid to that.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Curious that a trilogy
based on work by the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Goosebumps</i> guy
could wind up with an 18 certificate, I gave it a go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As it turned out, the films improved as they
went on, as evidenced by the fact I watched <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Part
One – 1994</i>, thought “yeah, not bad” and left it for about two months, then
watched <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Part Two – 1978</i> and promptly
watched <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">1666</i> the very next day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The trilogy tells the tale of a city cursed
by a bizarrely high murder rate, with random citizens embarking on serial
killing sprees every so often for no obvious reason, which the locals blame on
a witch’s curse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The final part goes
back to the city’s founding to tell the true story of the witch, and it’s a
satisfying end to the trilogy cleverly played out by having the cast members of
the first two films play their various ancestors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even if, like me, you have no real interest
in slashers, this trilogy’s worth a whirl.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(Just be aware that yes, these movies absolutely earn their 18 certificates.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re not for the squeamish.)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">7. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Black Widow</i>
(dir. Cate Shortland)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve said many times before that the thing about the Marvel
Cinematic Universe is that it really does feel like an elaborate TV show, so
the individual movies rarely stick in the mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This was doubly proved this year, as Disney+ started their run of MCU TV
shows, which I’ve found much more enjoyable and more suited to the source
material than the movies, and the fact that the MCU movie I did enjoy the most
of this year’s selection was the one that had the least connective tissue to
the wider storylines (although in fairness I haven’t seen <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Eternals</i>).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Black Widow</i> feels like the MCU’s take on
a Jason Bourne movie, and a very enjoyable one it is too, with an excellent
cast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s telling that in a film full
of excellent performances, the standout is the always wonderful Florence Pugh
as smart-alec little sister Yelena – who promptly turned up in the last MCU TV
show of the year, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Hawkeye</i>, and stole
the show there too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Can we just skip the
movies altogether and concentrate on the TV shows?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Just me?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Never mind then.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">6. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Romeo & Juliet</i>
(dir. Simon Godwin)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That whole pandemic thing putting the kibosh on theatres has
left playhouses with a bit of an issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While most chose to film their current offerings as they were, this didn’t
really work without an audience (I tried to watch the RSC’s production of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Winter’s Tale</i> that was broadcast on
BBC4 twice, but just couldn’t get through it).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The National Theatre, meanwhile, decided to take their starry version of
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Romeo & Juliet</i> and properly
movie-fy it, and it was great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Using
different parts of the building for different scenes and editing the script
with ruthless efficiency to a tight 90 minutes (first version of this play ever
where the “two hours’ traffic of our stage” line is an exaggeration rather than
an underestimate?), it’s a propulsive take that still finds time for some great
new ideas – hinting at romance between Mercutio and Bernardo, highlighting the
misogyny of the time by giving most of Lord Capulet’s lines to Tamsin Greig’s
imperious Lady Capulet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An object lesson
in how to make the best of a bad situation.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">5. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A Quiet Place Part
II</i> (dir. John Krasinski)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A classic example of sequelitis, this would be an absolute
classic if it weren’t for the existence of its superior predecessor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A Quiet
Place</i> was a masterclass, a drum-taut horror of exquisite simplicity – don’t
make a sound, or aliens will appear and eat you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Part II</i>
is, basically, more of the same but with the sequel’s requirement to raise the
stakes somewhat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This results in a
slightly flabbier screenplay that, notably, has one character act stupidly for
no reason whatsoever beyond “we need something to happen here for the climax”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a shame, as otherwise this is just as
gripping as the first movie, and makes the excellent choice to essentially promote
the brilliant Millicent Simmonds to lead actor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If this was the first <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Quiet Place</i>,
it’d be one of the greats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As it is, it
has to settle for second place.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">4. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lupin III: The
First</i> (dir. Takashi Yamazaki)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is stretching it a bit as it’s a 2019 movie, but it
only came out on DVD in Britain in 2021 and as far as I can tell it never had a
proper British cinema release, so I have decided it counts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, it’s brilliant and I want to talk about
its being brilliant.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;">The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lupin III</i> franchise is slightly knotty even by the standards of
Japanese long-running franchises, which often require lengthy Wikipedia
articles to explain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the early 1900s,
Maurice LeBlanc wrote a series of stories about legendary thief Arsène
Lupin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the 1960s, Monkey Punch
(possibly not his real name) started up a very much unauthorised manga about
Lupin’s grandson.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lupin III</i> manga has launched a number of
separate anime adaptations, most famously the 1977-80 series that, via spin-off
film <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Castle of Cagliostro</i>, gave a
certain Hayao Miyazaki his first full-length movie as director.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This confusingly-titled film is simply the
latest adaptation, one that requires no real previous knowledge of any of the
many previous iterations to enjoy (I’ve only seen the excellent <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cagliostro</i>).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Basically, it’s your classic globetrotting adventure in the finest <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Indiana Jones</i> mould, with Lupin and his
mates on the hunt for an archaeologist’s diary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What’s notable is that this is the first <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lupin</i> to be made in CG, which is a medium that frequently doesn’t
do anime style any favours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thankfully,
Yamazaki – who previously helmed the sterling <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dragon Quest</i> movie <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Your Story</i>,
which also did a great job of translating anime artwork to 3D – knows what he’s
about, and the film looks <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">gorgeous</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Blending the high detail of CG with the
fluidity of hand-drawn animation, it’s invariably a joy to look at.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With its setting, too, it feels like this is
the film that Spielberg’s take on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Tintin</i>
wanted to be. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;">3. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">In the Heights</i> (dir. Jon M. Chu)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;">One of two big crowdpleaser
musicals set in New York City (haven’t seen Spielberg’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">West Side Story</i> yet) – amusingly, they were filmed around the same
time in some of the same areas – this adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first
stage production is unashamedly big and colourful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Threading through several stories around a
heatwave that leads to a blackout, the plotting isn’t particularly inventive
but it’s heartfelt, and director Chu makes the most of his opportunity to do
more than a theatre stage can offer – animated flicks on a good-natured ribbing
contest, a huge synchronised swimming sequence straight out of an Esther
Williams film, a bravura bit where duetting lovers start dancing sideways up a
building.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The sort of film that will get
you doing a little boogie in your seat while watching whether you’re aware or
not.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;">2. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Last Night in Soho</i> (dir. Edgar Wright)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;">Wright’s homage to giallo cinema
was always going to be of interest, but he’s produced possibly his deepest
movie here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a shy, sheltered fashion
student obsessed with the 1960s moves from Cornwall to the big smoke for
university, gets overwhelmed but finds grounding in dreams where she plays out
the life of an aspiring starlet in, yes, the 1960s, then starts to wonder what
happened to her, the film’s themes of misogyny and the dark side of nostalgia prove
grist for plenty of thesis mills.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Relative newbie Thomasin Mackensie (best known for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Jojo Rabbit</i>) is great in the lead, and she’s surrounded by some
absolutely top-class talent both in front of the lens (Anya Taylor-Joy!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Terence Stamp!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Matt Smith!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Diana Rigg, at her Diana Riggest<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>in her last ever role!) and behind (Krysty Wilson-Cairns providing sterling
screenplay support, Chung Chung-hoon, Park Chan-wook’s cinematographer of
choice, getting those lurid colours just like Papa Argento used to make).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 4.5pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-left: 40.35pt; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Violet
Evergarden: The Movie</i> (dir. Taichi Ishidate)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 22.35pt;"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 22.35pt;">When I see a movie in the
cinema, it’s quite usual for me to look at my watch at least once or
twice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not necessarily because I’m
bored, but I like to have a rough idea of how much time is left.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Violet
Evergarden</i>, which is a chunky old movie at roughly two and a half hours, I
kept looking because I wanted there to be more movie to come.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was my most purely pleasurable cinema trip
of the year.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 22.35pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Violet
Evergarden</i> started as a book series before getting adapted for an anime
series by Netflix.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Following the series,
a special extra slightly-longer episode and a made-for-TV-movie, this big
proper movie provides an ending to the story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(You could just watch this film and follow everything, but frankly the
TV show’s great and you should watch the whole lot.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An unashamedly weepie romantic drama<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>that follows a former child soldier in the
aftermath of a shattering civil war (the series is set in a sort of alt-Europe
and the civil war is a clear analogue for World War One), it’s an enthralling
tale that examines trauma with grace and gentleness and, if you’ve watched the
whole series, provides an excellent wrap-up for Violet’s tale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fact that it’s quite preposterously
gorgeous (made by the mighty Kyoto Animation – it was what was under production
during that horrific arson attack a couple of years ago) doesn’t hurt
either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two and a half hours, and I
could have sat happily in the cinema for twice that.</p>
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<![endif]--></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-76389415826148360202022-01-01T13:38:00.008+00:002022-01-01T13:38:54.230+00:00My top ten albums of 2021<p> A nice mix this year, I feel. Blatant cheating by Julia Stone by putting out both a solo album and one with her brother but they were both excellent so hey. Since my usual "embed YouTube vids" didn't seem to work properly when viewing this blog on a phone last year I've made a playlist instead.</p><p>10. Iron Maiden - <i>Senjutsu</i></p><p>9. Foo Fighters - <i>Medicine at Midnight</i></p><p>8. Sleigh Bells - <i>Texis</i></p><p>7. Mogwai - <i>As the Love Continues</i></p><p>6. Julia Stone - <i>Sixty Summers</i></p><p>5. Bleachers - <i>Take the Sadness out of Saturday Night</i></p><p>4. Angus & Julia Stone - <i>Life is Strange</i></p><p>3. Nao - <i>And Then Life Was Beautiful</i></p><p>2. We Are The Union - <i>Ordinary Life</i></p><p>1. Chvrches - <i>Screen Violence</i></p><p><i> </i></p><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjtoZ8RI8rMIOsG05k3NtepbFE7P7tdzj">A nice playlist for you</a><br /></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-29034510346052758512021-09-27T21:07:00.001+01:002021-09-27T21:07:12.191+01:00I did a meme<p> I spent a good forty minutes on this so I'm not going to let it sink below the waves forever on your social medias. It will live in perpetuity here, shrouded in glory and the knowledge that the text is a bit too small.</p><p> </p><p>(yes I know the plural of media is media)</p><p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipk4veN4beV_bSh4kLQpcrfyAhLaxNTBYIbeJEciaYM4nw2D92UexPWL4_DJU7Foqt3S3qKn10ITKjVO75MjxlEjOSbMORZSWSUUyTpHBuFOrnQ6QfeV_YAz7fvSp1tGNp9UouUw/s650/finished+i+guess.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="650" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipk4veN4beV_bSh4kLQpcrfyAhLaxNTBYIbeJEciaYM4nw2D92UexPWL4_DJU7Foqt3S3qKn10ITKjVO75MjxlEjOSbMORZSWSUUyTpHBuFOrnQ6QfeV_YAz7fvSp1tGNp9UouUw/s320/finished+i+guess.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <br /><p></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-4007263011901398532021-01-12T18:03:00.005+00:002021-01-12T18:08:06.891+00:00My Top 10 Films of 2020<p> Bit late. Blame Brexit.</p><span><a name='more'></a></span><p>
</p><p class="MsoNormal">10. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7984734/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Lighthouse</i></a>
(dir. Robert Eggers)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The last film I saw in a “proper” cinema before the first
lockdown (I did manage to squeeze in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Parasite</i>
at my local arts centre) was, erm, a claustrophobic horror about two men
trapped in isolation and slowly going mad.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Yep.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Robert Eggers’ two-hander
sees new lighthouse-keeper Ephraim Winslow (Robert Pattinson) join veteran
Thomas Wake (Willem Dafoe) on a rain-lashed New England island in the 19<sup>th</sup>
century.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just before their month-long
stint is due to finish, a storm keeps them stuck in the lighthouse and it all
goes a bit wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a simple set-up,
and in honesty the movie’s a bit too long, but Pattinson and Dafoe’s fantastic,
committed performances would be enough without taking in the truly astonishing
cinematography.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shot in black-and-white
on lenses from the 1910s to the 1930s, in a ratio (1.19:1) so obscure I’ve
never heard of it – and I like weird ratios – it’s absolutely jawdropping to
look at it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m glad I managed to see it
on a proper cinema screen because I don’t know how well it’d translate to TV. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">9. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1086064/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bill & Ted Face
the Music</i></a> (dir. Dean Parisot)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://deliciousblogging.blogspot.com/2010/05/five-great-endings.html">Many years ago I listed some of my favourite endings</a> on this
very blog, and one of them was the gloriously upbeat finale to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When, ten-odd years ago, the series’ writers
Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon started talking about a third film I was
nervous.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then 2016 onward happened,
and it became increasingly obvious that a film starring two good-natured,
inherently decent guys whose first commandment is “Be excellent to each other”
was exactly what was needed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when
circumstances made it that it would be in cinemas shortly after the initial
lockdown, it became basically my most-anticipated film of the year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I quite wanted it to be my first foray back
into cinemas, but that ended up being <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
New Mutants</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since I was
increasingly convinced that film would never be released, I was fine with
that.) </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It turns out that
the newspapers at the end of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bogus
Journey</i> proclaiming world peace were an addition by the director that the
writers hadn’t written, so the happy-ever-after is quietly ignored.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, that initial success for the Wyld
Stallyns is shown to have tailed off in the 25-odd years between movies and
Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted (Keanu Reeves) are now middle-aged, somewhat washed
up and still trying to write the song that will unite the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rufus’ daughter Kelly (Kristen Schaal) turns
up out of the blue to tell them that they have literally a few hours left to do
it or history will fall apart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they
figure, if they’ve written it in the future, why not just jump forward a few
years and get the song from themselves?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Inspiration without the perspiration, if you will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Meanwhile, their daughters Billie (Brigette
Lundy-Paine) and Thea (Samara Weaving) go off on their own time-travelling
adventure to put together history’s ultimate supergroup so their dads have a
suitable backing band.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While a lot of fun
is had with the core plot (special marks to the Future Bill and Ted who have
become insufferable rockstars with inexplicable English accents and a dress
style Mötley Crüe would dismiss as “a bit much”), parts of the film do feel
like a remix of the first two.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Regardless, the cast is universally delightful, laughs are plentiful, and
I think I spent the entire movie with a big smile on my face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bogus
Journey</i> may remain my favourite of the trilogy, but <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Face the Music</i> was absolutely a movie 2020 needed.</p><p class="MsoNormal"> <br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">8. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8579674/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">1917</i></a> (dir. Sam
Mendes)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m a bit of a sucker for oners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes indulgent and show-offy they may
be, but my word they work well when they work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So Sam Mendes’ attempt to do an entire WW1 movie as a oner would
automatically be of interest, but it doesn’t hurt that it was a damn good movie
too.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Birdman</i>, <i>1917</i> doesn’t pretend to be a real
one-take film, taking place over about a day (the lead character gets knocked
out partway through and wakes up hours later, allowing for some variety and for
Roger Deakins to show off with some characteristically astonishing
cinematography, here involving a ruined French town lit by flares at night).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a relatively straightforward setup
involving two young soldiers who have to manually deliver a message to another
platoon not to attack, and the one-take nature superbly delivers the chaos of
war.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">7. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9214832/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Emma.</i></a> (dir.
Autumn de Wilde) <br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">At the other end from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">1917</i>’s
technical virtuosity, we have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Emma.</i>,
which is a tale told simply but well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’ve not read Austen’s novel so have no idea if it’s a good adaptation,
but the film is witty, warm and excellently acted (the always-brilliant Anya
Taylor-Joy, to no-one’s surprise, is the standout as the lead).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It also looks stunning, betraying debut
director de Wilde’s background as an acclaimed photographer.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">6. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7713068/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn</a>)</i> (dir. Cathy Yan)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m in the minority of quite enjoying 2016’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Suicide Squad</i>, but even those who hated
it (i.e. everyone else) are in agreement that that film’s standout was Margot
Robbie’s brilliant portrayal of the Joker’s psychiatrist-turned-deranged-lover,
Harley Quinn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So a spin-off starring her
was an eminently sensible move.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Suicide Squad</i> was DC’s fairly
transparent attempt at<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Guardians of the
Galaxy</i>, then <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Birds of Prey</i> is
DC’s fairly transparent attempt at <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deadpool</i>
– the narrative follows Harley’s fractured psyche by jumping around all over
the place, the violence is turned up, and Harley’s narrating but getting easily
distracted much like Wade did (one brilliant moment has her start a thought in
voiceover then finish it “in scene”, as it were).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Add in some great fight choreography, an
excellent soundtrack, sterling supporting work from the rest of the cast
(standouts being Mary Elizabeth Winstead as an assassin who wants to be cool
and badass but can’t quite manage it and Ewan McGregor as a flamboyantly evil
crime lord who’s having so much fun that you forgive his occasionally slipping
accent) and a tame hyena, and the result is one of the most trashily fun movies
I’ve seen in ages.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">5. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8637428/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Farewell</i>
</a>(dir. Lulu Wang)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The plot of this delightful Chinese-American comedy-drama is
straight out of “you couldn’t make it up” territory, literally – it actually
happened to writer-director Wang.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the
big-screen retelling, Awkwafina plays Billi, a naturalised American who left
China as a child and prepares to return – her beloved grandmother Nai Nai
(Shuzhen Zhao) has been diagnosed with terminal cancer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But rather than tell Nai Nai she’s not long
for this world, her family have decided to hide the diagnosis from her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So Billi’s cousin has been pressganged into
proposing to his girlfriend – a big wedding providing a convenient excuse for
the extended family to return to the motherland and see the unknowingly ailing Nai
Nai one more time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The result is an
unexpectedly funny and very moving examination of family dynamics with a
universally brilliant cast.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">4. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9606374/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">On the Rocks</i>
</a>(dir. Sofia Coppola)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m reasonably confident this film was devised purely for my
own benefit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of my favourite
directors casting two of my favourite actors as father and daughter?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Especially when the director’s previous
big-screen work with one of the actors was one of my all-time favourite
films?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(We’ll ignore the dire Netflix
special <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A Very Murray Christmas</i>,
which I could bear about ten minutes of.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Yes please.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">On the Rocks</i> stars Rashida Jones as
author Laura, struggling with writer’s block.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She’s got a seemingly perfect family life with two adorable daughters
and dashing husband Dean (Marlon Wayans), but he’s been a bit distant
lately.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He insists it’s due to the
pressures of launching his latest start-up, but she starts to suspect he’s
having an affair with one of his work colleagues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She reluctantly confesses her fears to her
playboy father Felix (Bill Murray) and he immediately concurs and persuades her
to start trailing Dean.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus starts a
very low-key detective story as Laura and Felix snoop around New York, using
Felix’s long-established contacts (he’s the sort of old-fashioned raconteur who
knows every maître d’ in three continents) to try and catch Dean out.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Coppola directing
Murray in a film that’s in love with the city it’s set in brings obvious <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lost in Translation</i> comparisons to mind,
but <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">On the Rocks</i> is more structured –
and, arguably and surprisingly, a bit lighter in tone, without quite so much of
a melancholy undercurrent – than that classic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Laura and Felix’s laid-back gumshoeing gives the film a quiet, breezy
feel, but there’s enough emotional depth in their frequent two-handers to add a
decent amount of weight to proceedings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And Coppola’s genius for small but immediately memorable roles persists
– the breakout character here being Jenny Slate’s vapid Vanessa, always somehow
catching Laura when they’re dropping their kids off and subjecting her to the
latest dramas of her life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All this, and
a scene specifically designed to make you observe what nice legs Jessica
Henwick has.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Definitely a film made for
me.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">3. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6751668/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Parasite</i></a> (dir.
Bong Joon-ho)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Not really a film that I need to write about much, given how
many acres of commentary it’s already – and rightly – generated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Interestingly, the other two films of Bong’s
I’ve seen have both wrapped up his interests in class struggle in sci-fi
wrappings – monster movie in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Host</i>
and dystopian thriller in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Snowpiercer</i>
– but as much as I love sci-fi used as a societal mirror, it’s refreshing to
see a film that doesn’t attempt to hide the corrosive effects of capitalism
behind metaphor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The sort of film that
will have dissertations written about it for years, and rightly so.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">2. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6439020/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Personal
History of David Copperfield</i></a> (dir. Armando Iannucci)</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Given Iannucci’s reputation as one of Britain’s most
merciless satirists, the idea of a kindhearted adaptation of one of Dickens’
sunniest works is...not something I’d’ve necessarily expected from the man
whose last effort was the brilliant but pitch-black <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Death of Stalin</i> (see my list from a couple of years ago).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yet, this sunlit costume comedy was so
delightful that it ended up being the only film I saw twice in the cinema this
year (not something that was easy to do, admittedly).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Iannucci’s take on
Dickens’ semi-autobiographical novel starts on the brilliant conceit that David
(Dev Patel) is giving a reading of his work, much in the way Dickens himself
was famed for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This simple but effective
set-up allows all sorts of neat tricks, as David stands in the corner and
watches his own birth; or the vile Mr. Murdstone (Darren Boyd) literally
reaches in to one scene to spoil young David’s fun; or the source novel’s
rather cruel discarding of David’s first wife Dora (Morfydd Clark) is rewritten
to a less heartless conclusion by Dora herself.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Any Dickens
adaptation is automatically going to draw in the finest actors available to
play the smallest of parts, and Iannucci doubles down on that by adopting
theatre-style colourblind casting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Patel
is spectacular as David, whether it’s Chaplin-esque clowning, some truly
remarkable impersonations of his fellow cast members or perfectly timed
deliveries of some brilliant lines (“Do you have a lettuce somewhere covered in
ointment?”).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With the possible exception
of Benedict Wong’s slightly one-note Mr. Wickham, all his co-stars bring their
A-game, with special plaudits going to Hugh Laurie’s Mr. Dick – what is usually
a comic side role is given an undercurrent of real heart and pathos.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The film’s not
perfect – it arguably overplays the comedy in places, and a slight rejigging of
the book’s events makes the end very rushed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But it makes you smile like few other things from 2020 can.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3281548/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">
</a></span></span></span><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3281548/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Little
Women</i></a> (dir. Greta Gerwig)
<p class="MsoNormal">As with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Emma.</i>, a
lavish costume drama based on a classic book I’ve never read so I don’t know if
it’s a particularly good adaptation or not (from what I can gather it rather
freely mixes the source material with concepts from the author’s own life).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I don’t care – again, as with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Emma.</i>, this is a story told (relatively)
simply but brilliantly.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gerwig takes Louisa
May Alcott’s novel and mixes it around, so that rather than a linear
beginning-to-end we start near the end and have flashbacks gradually catching
us up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is my one complaint with the
film – if you’re not familiar with the book, it can be confusing at first (I
thought Florence Pugh was acting weirdly infantile in early scenes, not
realising she was actually playing a thirteen-year-old very well).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that is my one
complaint.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everything else is
superb.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wonderfully shot, wonderfully
acted, wonderfully written.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My reliance
on Saoirse Ronan as a bellwether of quality continues to pay dividends.</p>
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<![endif]--></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-63087050261402051742020-12-31T20:51:00.002+00:002020-12-31T20:51:06.301+00:00My Top 10 Albums of 2020<p> Usually number 1 would be disqualified from the list due to being a collection of re-recorded (and sometimes re-arranged) old pieces rather than a new studio album. But it was head and shoulders above everything else and 2020's been enough of a headache without worrying about rules I made up myself.</p><span><a name='more'></a></span><p>10. Caribou - <i>Suddenly</i></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/I3hDvOL7E7Y" width="320" youtube-src-id="I3hDvOL7E7Y"></iframe></i></div><p></p><p>9. Sewerslvt - <i>Draining Love Story</i></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RgFaK6ZQifE" width="320" youtube-src-id="RgFaK6ZQifE"></iframe></i></div><i><br /> </i><br /><i> </i>8. Green Day - <i>Father of All...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/g8PPugsQWwM" width="320" youtube-src-id="g8PPugsQWwM"></iframe></div><br /></i>7. Ghostpoet -<i> I Grow Tired But Dare Not Fall Asleep</i><p></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/xmvprg7NFRk" width="320" youtube-src-id="xmvprg7NFRk"></iframe></i></div><i><br /> </i>6. Gorillaz - <i>Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez</i><p></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/FJVV8o6vgso" width="320" youtube-src-id="FJVV8o6vgso"></iframe></i></div><i><br /> </i>5. Haim - <i>Women in Music Pt. III<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vfZSgr_si4I" width="320" youtube-src-id="vfZSgr_si4I"></iframe></div><br /></i>4. Run the Jewels - <i>RTJ4</i><p></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6-M15L4BTqI" width="320" youtube-src-id="6-M15L4BTqI"></iframe></i></div><i><br /> </i>3. The Naked and Famous - <i>Recover</i><p></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fNtVDfcAd5I" width="320" youtube-src-id="fNtVDfcAd5I"></iframe></i></div><i><br /> </i>2. Hannah Georgas - <i>All That Emotion<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bc1v2fzu6zE" width="320" youtube-src-id="bc1v2fzu6zE"></iframe></div><br /></i>1. Joe Hisaishi - <i>Dream Songs<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/l0GN40EL1VU" width="320" youtube-src-id="l0GN40EL1VU"></iframe></div><br /></i><br /><p></p>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-73439212864510120762020-06-27T22:07:00.001+01:002020-06-27T22:07:24.688+01:00Addendum to the addendumWell, I shoved "Into the Unknown" out of my head but it got replaced by "Show Yourself", which is still resident. Progress...?<br />
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On a related note, if you have access to Disney+ I implore you to check out their new series <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10196382/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i>Into the Unknown: Making Frozen II</i></a>. If you're a massive geek like what I am, heck, even if you're not, it's a delight. I love a good making of and such things are traditionally thin on the ground with Disney disc releases, so a whole series - 6 episodes, about forty minutes each, a good four hours' worth of content - is an unalloyed joy. Quite apart from reminding you how much effort goes into these things (and a riposte to the feeling, which I admit to having myself at times, that a CG animation is somehow less involved and requiring of craft than a hand-drawn or stop-motion feature), it's surprisingly enthralling. A good chunk of the first three episodes centres around whether (yes) "Show Yourself" will even make it into the movie, and it's riveting and weirdly tense even though you know exactly what'll happen.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-79464640685753316352020-06-25T11:10:00.000+01:002020-06-25T11:10:11.527+01:00AddendumI wasn't wrong in my last post about "Into the Unknown". I've listened to it twice within the last hour in an attempt to dislodge it from my brain and it ain't budging.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-57951452309434776942020-06-23T22:23:00.000+01:002020-06-23T22:23:04.938+01:00Arendelle boogalooI think I enjoyed <i>Frozen II</i> more on a second watch? Certainly some bits were clearer. The "Show Yourself" sequence is gorgeous but a little confusing the first go-around.<br />
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Now that I've done that I guess I've got another week of "Into the Unknown" stuck in my head.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-30765619721391282922020-05-02T14:30:00.003+01:002020-05-02T14:30:54.735+01:00Album nameMy latest bored-during-lockdown idea: SPELL YOUR NAME WITH ALBUMS WOO<br />
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woo<br />
<br />Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-60678151986265594952019-12-29T22:08:00.000+00:002019-12-29T22:28:37.656+00:00My Top Ten Movies of 2019<div class="MsoNormal">
Usual rules apply: stuff from 2018 that I saw in cinemas in 2019 may have snuck on, stuff from 2019 that I haven't seen yet may end up on next year's list.</div>
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<b>10. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5437928/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Colette</i> </a>(dir.
Wash Westmoreland)</b></div>
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A true story about a trailblazing author denied her rightful
place in history?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it’s a period
piece with lots of sex?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Quick, send up
the Knightley-Signal!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, of course
this turn-of-the-century (last century, erk) Paris tale stars Keira
Knightley.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And of course she’s
excellent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As is the film as a whole.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She’s playing Sidonie-Gabrielle
Colette, who is married to a famed author known simply as Willy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s something of an open secret that Willy
is a sort of one-man publishing house, doing some writing himself but for the
most part hiring talented ghostwriters who are happy to be paid to be published
under his name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Seeing<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a gap in the market, he suggests that Colette
give it a whirl, and she complies with a story drawn from her life at a girl’s
school that becomes one of the first examples of what we’d see as a modern
publishing sensation – sold-out print runs, cheap merchandise, the works.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But she gets increasingly restless that her <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Claudine</i> novels aren’t being published
under her name, and trouble brews.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The film is
admittedly a bit piecemeal in places, partially the result of having to cover
several years in two hours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it
always delivers thanks to its cast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Knightley is dependably excellent in what’s become her default sort of
role, but Dominic West matches her in what is arguably the harder part – making
this man charming and likeable, but still an obstacle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lovingly recreated early 1900s France is
a pleasure, and the movie subtly but cleverly makes its call for equality in a
rather delightful way – a couple of the supporting roles are filled by
transgender actors playing cisgender parts, something I only found out about
when reading up on the movie a few days after seeing it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it also achieved what is surely its
ultimate goal – I now want to read the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Claudine</i>
books. </div>
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<b>9. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4633694/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse</i></a> (dirs. Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman)</b></div>
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This is the fourth, count ‘em, individual take on Spidey in
seventeen years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In those seventeen
years we have had 3 Tobey Maguires, 2 Andrew Garfields, 2 Tom Hollands (or five
if you count the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avengers</i> movies and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Captain America 3</i>), and a partridge in a
pear tree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Venom</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And now this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So how does <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Verse</i> justify its existence?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>How did it win the Best Animated Feature Oscar?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More importantly, how did it end up on my top
ten list?</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Verse</i> kicks off with Peter Parker
(here voiced by Chris Pine) about ten years into his superheroing duties.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s got very good at it, and he’s in the
midst of stopping the Kingpin’s latest plot to rip a dimensional hole open
under New York.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then – spoiler alert! –
he fails, and Kingpin kills him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The actual
Spider-Man we’re following here is Miles Morales, an Afro-Latino kid voiced by Shameik
Moore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s also received a spider bite
and also been granted powers (albeit with a couple of twists, like the ability
to turn invisible).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And as he witnesses
Classic Spidey’s demise, he takes up the mantle and attempts to stop the
Kingpin himself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With some training from
another Peter Parker (Jake Johnson) who was spat out by that dimensional
hole.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Admittedly this Peter is
bellyflopping into middle-age, overweight and depressed, but it’ll be fine,
probably.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Verse</i> works for multiple
reasons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, by choosing a different
lead, it immediately feels fresher.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An
important part of the story is that anyone can be a hero, and in making the
hero a minority twice over the point is made that much more effectively.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(And it’s interesting to see a Spidey who has
not just a father figure but an actual father, one that’s alive and
everything.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second, by making it
animated instead of live-action it allows the filmmakers to lean into something
that’s often lost in superhero movies – that comics in general, and Spider-Man
comics in particular, are often <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">really,
really</i> weird.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Third, it’s frequently
hilarious (anything Nicolas Cage says, the bit with the bagel...).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But fourth, and most importantly, it does new
things with animation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I love all
varieties of animation, but CGI has become increasingly staid in the last few
years, as the technology gets to the point where photorealism is possible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Verse</i>
says nuts to that and embraces its comic roots with a remarkable visual style –
panels and lettering, deliberately jerky movement (technical term “animating on
twos”, look it up, it’s interesting if you’re a nerd like me) and more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t always work – the weird effect
where out-of-focus background stuff is made to look like the “ink” isn’t quite
aligned just comes off like you’ve forgotten to put your 3D glasses on – but it
does most of the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it does it in
a movie with heart, wit and originality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Oh, and a great soundtrack.</div>
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<b>8. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3385524/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Stan & Ollie</i></a>
(dir. Jon S. Baird)</b></div>
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One of those films that you can tell is going to be a safe
bet from a brief précis, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Stan & Ollie</i>
doesn’t wow with invention but it’s a delight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Focusing in on Laurel (Steve Coogan) and Hardy (John C. Reilly) towards
the end of their careers, as they tour theatres in provincial England, it
offers a gentle, loving look at one of the greatest double-acts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bar a quietly impressive one-take prologue in
the ‘30s, following them from their trailers to the set of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Way Out West</i>, it resists directorial grandstanding in favour of
foregrounding the performances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what
performances – while Coogan’s great, it is frankly baffling how Reilly didn’t
end up with a wheelbarrow’s worth of awards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And, much like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Colette</i>, I went
away wanting to watch all of Stan and Ollie’s back catalogue.</div>
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<b>7. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1560220/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Zombieland: Double Tap</i></a> (dir. Ruben Fleischer)</b></div>
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This is a neat example of how low expectations can
help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went into <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Double Tap</i> not really planning to be wowed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I loved the first <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Zombieland</i>, but a ten-year gap between movies is pushing it,
surely?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(All to do with multiple failed
attempts to turn it into a TV show, as I understand.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then the first trailer looked pretty
terrible, but the second looked a little better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I gave it a go, and loved it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s barely a
plot, just an excuse for the returning cast (two of whom have become full-on
A-listers in the past decade) to goof about and splat zombies creatively.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Its freewheeling feel papers over cracks –
there’s a hilariously half-arsed throwaway line about ten minutes in addressing
how some places still have electric power x number of years after the zombie
apocalypse – and while there is some reasonably well-rounded character stuff in
there, it knows it’s a turn-your-brain-off-and-enjoy movie and doesn’t try to
be anything else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s a very nice
oner hidden in the middle, which I always appreciate, and Rosario Dawson’s in
it so that’s an automatic extra five points.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Sometimes low expectations pay high dividends.</div>
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<b>6. <i><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1979376/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Toy Story 4</a></i> (dir. Josh Cooley)</b></div>
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The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Toy Story</i>
trilogy is The Thing That Should Not Be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Three films, made separately at random intervals, all cast-iron
classics?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a reasonable argument to
be made that they improve as they go on?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(I’ve been trying to decide if <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">1</i>
or <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">2</i> is the better film for twenty
years, I’ll never make my mind up.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So
making a fourth is surely a fool’s errand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There have been several short films following <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">3</i>, from five to thirty minutes, and they’ve all been great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But a full fourth feature?</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Toy Story 4</i> is the worst <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Toy Story</i> movie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But as I said to a friend shortly after
seeing it, that’s like saying “a lesser Da Vinci”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s still incredible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The core idea of Woody not knowing what to do
with himself after his new kid, Bonnie, just isn’t that interested in playing
with him, is simple but perfect, and the idea that she creates a new toy by
gluing googly eyes on a spork that gains sentience is weird as all hell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But all the characters find it just as weird,
so it works.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I said in my <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Verse</i> review above, CG animation
tends to be a little unimaginative these days, but that doesn’t mean it can’t
wow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Toy
Story 4</i> looks incredible, and there are a couple of establishing shots
where for a moment my brain went, “Well, that’s a live-action shot.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The script’s great, the new additions to the cast
are excellent (especially Key and Peele as a pair of sewn-together cheap
carnival prizes with ideas above their station) and while it doesn’t get as
lump-in-the-throat as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">3</i> it remains a
worthy coda to the series.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just...leave
it now, Pixar, yeah?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’ve got away
with it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">again</i> somehow, let’s call it
good.</div>
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<b>5. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2066051/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rocketman</i></a> (dir.
Dexter Fletcher)</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, it’s hard not to draw parallels here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dexter Fletcher, infamously, took over
uncredited on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bohemian Rhapsody</i> after
original director Bryan Singer was given the push.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A biopic of a flamboyant singer and pianist
who simultaneously managed to be very rock-and-roll and very English is a
description of both that movie and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rocketman</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the latter seems almost like a
riposte.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bohemian Rhapsody</i> was a safe, sanitised movie that lived and died
on Rami Malek’s fantastic performance, but was otherwise very timid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rocketman</i>,
on the other hand, starts with Elton John (Taron Egerton, excellent) arriving
at rehab in full stage costume.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When
introducing himself, he imagines his childhood self (Matthew Illesley) watching
him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then he gets into an argument
with said imagining.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then they start
duetting “The Bitch is Back”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then
Kid Elton drags the rest of the rehab group into 1950s suburbia, where the
neighbours are in the midst of an elaborate dance sequence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the music
biopic as music video, and it’s exhilarating.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While there are a few moments that I may have wished for a more
conservative approach (mainly because most of the story was unknown to me, and
I wanted to know when certain songs were actually written as opposed to when it
makes sense for the narrative to use them for dramatic emphasis), it’s hard to
argue with a film that chooses to dramatise the glorious “Saturday Night’s
Alright (For Fighting)” in a seeming one-shot take that sees teen Elton start
the song in a pub, sneak out, grow into adult Elton, lead a bunch of Teddy boys
on a dance round a funfair that disintegrates into a punch-up, then barrel back
into the pub to finish the song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
after <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bohemian Rhapsody</i>’s primly
turning away from Freddie’s life in favour of a 12A certificate, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rocketman</i>’s headfirst dive into piles of
drugs and sex (sometimes literally) is refreshing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>4. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154796/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avengers: Endgame</i></a>
(dirs. Joe and Antony Russo)</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indeed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I said
last year, my major issue with the MCU’s generally excellent output is that the
cross-pollination is to a point that each individual film feels homogenous,
like an episode of a TV show rather than a film in its own right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Which I <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">think</i>
is the point Scorsese was making, but he phrased it spectacularly badly.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Infinity
War</i> somehow avoided that, and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Endgame</i>
somehow continues by being a sequel to twenty-one other movies and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">working</i>.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fact that the
film’s an actual end to several plots and characters works very much in its
favour, giving a proper finality to events.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The time-travel aspect is an act of genius, making it a sort of victory
lap of a decade’s worth of movies that works differently depending on the
movie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avengers Assemble</i> is improved by giving us a glimpse as to what the
team were up to inbetween other scenes, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Guardians
of the Galaxy</i> squeezes one more laugh by showing that the classic opening
sequence of Peter Quill dancing about to “Come and Get Your Love” looks really
stupid without the background music, and most impressively, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thor: the Dark World</i> provides the
movie’s most heartfelt moment, as Thor gets a chance for one last conversation
with his mother before she’s destined to die.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the sheer
amount of stuff going on means that a three-hour movie somehow whizzes by.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lack of half the cast is a bonus,
allowing for more character-driven stuff: somehow, Thor and Nebula, the
lunkheaded god and the generic bad girl, come out of this as the most
well-rounded characters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are
stirring moments; silly moments; one of the comics’ most controversial recent
plotlines referenced in a way that’s hilarious, clever and satisfying; Paul
Rudd complimenting Chris Evans’ backside; Chris Evans complimenting Chris
Evans’ backside; the MCU acknowledging the many TV series for the first time <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ever</i> via a cameo for James
D’Arcy...there’s a bit of everything, really.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The problem is that it did it too well and now I’m not that bothered
about the MCU in the future because this was such a satisfying conclusion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>3. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6857112/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Us</i></a> (dir. Jordan
Peele)</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jordan Peele is a man who is going to provide a lot of
material for future dissertations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His
first film, the wickedly funny satire-horror <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Get Out</i>, examined blackness in the United States in the last days
of Obama’s presidency, be it feared or fetishised.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And now his second offering examines...well,
a lot, but mainly class.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it does it
through the medium of the home invasion movie.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lupita N’yongo is
Adelaide, who reluctantly goes on holiday with her husband and two children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Reluctantly because the holiday house is
round the corner from a beach <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>where she
had a traumatic experience as a child, one that left her temporarily mute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And indeed, spooky stuff occurs, and a
quartet of people break into the house one night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Except they’re doppelgangers of Adelaide and
her family, dressed in red boilersuits and carrying huge golden shears.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then it gets weird.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whereas <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Get Out</i> was frequently icily funny, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Us</i> plays it largely straighter and
stranger (it frequently feels like a feature-length <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Twilight Zone</i> episode, probably not a coincidence since Peele is
the host of that venerable series’ latest incarnation).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bizarre concept doesn’t always stick
together, but it’s done with enough conviction and atmosphere to sell it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>N’yongo must surely be award-laden for her
remarkable double-turn as Adelaide and her murderous counterpart Red, and there
are sufficient ideas and indelible images to power three lesser movies. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Us</i>
is a movie I’ve been turning round in my head since I saw it, and I suspect I
and many others will be doing it for a long time yet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>2. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9206798/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">All is True</i></a>
(dir. Kenneth Branagh)</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Given how little is known about most of Shakespeare’s life,
it’s odd there aren’t more dramatisations of his last years. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the theatre, there’s Edward Bond’s play <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bingo</i> and Peter Whelan’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Herbal Bed</i>, and he doesn’t even
appear in the latter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still, to this
small pool we can now add this excellent film.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Working loosely
off true events, most notably his daughter Susanna being accused of adultery
(which forms the backbone of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Herbal
Bed</i>), this excellent movie focuses on Shakespeare (Branagh) as he returns
to Stratford from London, his life’s work in the theatre done and his last few
years to wind down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A frayed
relationship with his wife Anne (Judi Dench) – frayed because she hardly ever
sees him and doesn’t know what to do with him now he’s hanging round the house
– needs mending, his garden needs tending, and his daughter needs defending
from scurrilous rumour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It naturally
follows that the result is an elegiac film, and it’s one that’s beautifully
shot, excellently acted and largely well-written (a slightly unnecessary and
unfocused scene with his former patron/possible lover the Earl of Southampton,
seemingly tacked on so they could put Ian McKellen’s name on the poster,
aside).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d argue that those wanting a
meaty dramatic telling of the Bard’s last days seek out a production of<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Bingo</i> instead, but this remains a
wonderful ode to the greatest writer of all.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<b><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437086/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alita: Battle Angel</i></a> (dir. Robert Rodriguez)
</b><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ah, subjectivity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
know full well this wasn’t the best film of 2019, but nothing made my heart
sing while sitting in the cinema more than this cheerfully daft sci-fi piece of
earnest hokum.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The story of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alita</i>’s birth is actually more
interesting than the plot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Starting out
as a manga by Yukito Kishiro with the unwieldy name of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gunnm</i>, the tale of an amnesiac cyborg was animated in the early
‘90s in the form of an OVA (Original Video Animation – a Japanese halfway house
between TV and film) given the catchier title of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Battle Angel Alita</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Guillermo del Toro fell in love with the video and passed it to James
Cameron, who optioned it after finishing <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While working on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avatar</i>, Cameron also made copious notes and multiple screenplays
for a live-action <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alita</i> and
eventually, realising he’d never get round to making it himself because he’d
become convinced that what the world wanted was four <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avatar</i> sequels, passed the project on to Robert Rodriguez, who
actually made the thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Phew.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alita</i>’s lengthy development process
lends the finished product something of a charmingly old-fashioned feel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It feels a little like a lost ‘90s
blockbuster, down to the fact that it <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO8fTk6oKQg">actually has a tie-in single</a>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, I love ‘90s blockbusters, so the film’s
already off to a good start.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></i>Of course, being a 2019 production means
that the effects are a little more impressive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The whole world is a joy to look at, from the nifty monocycles to Alita’s
intricately carved porcelain exoskeleton.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And that exoskeleton is the most impressive and most remarked-on bit of
work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In a brilliant visual touch, Alita’s
outsize eyes both pay homage to the graphic traditions of manga and make sense
in-universe – if real-life humanoid robots existed, an excellent way to skip
round the uncanny valley would be to purposely exaggerate some part of facial
anatomy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The resulting effect is initially
startling, but quickly becomes so natural it’s unnoticeable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(The casting of relative unknown Rosa Salazar
– who’s excellent in quite a hard role to pull off – may have helped here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fact I wasn’t already familiar with her
sold me on the effect to the point that when I saw an interview with her a day
or two after watching the movie, she looked wrong to me with regular human-size
eyes.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fact that
Rodriguez eventually ended up in the director’s chair is a bonus, too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He, of course, is better known for work up
the higher end of the BBFC ratings, and the fact that most of the cast are
largely robot parts means he can get away with some scenes that push the limits
of a 12 certificate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His ever-abundant
energy thrums through the piece, most obviously in the hilariously stupid sport
of choice in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alita</i>’s world, motorball
– a sort of rugby-meets-roller-derby-meets-basketball-meets-<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Speedball 2 </i>on the Amiga.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Although the bar fight comes a close second
there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the cast are game for
everything, be it Christoph Waltz waving a rocket-powered sledgehammer about, Mahershala
Ali wearing sunglasses at all times because he’s a baddy, or Jeff Fahey
cameoing as a bounty hunter with a pack of robot dogs and a cowboy hat just
because.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not the best movie
of the year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But my favourite movie of
the year.</div>
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<![endif]-->Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-81615763176024812882019-12-20T13:45:00.000+00:002019-12-20T13:45:39.270+00:00Burn the witchI mentioned back in August how prescient William Gibson's book <i>Virtual Light</i> was. I'm now reading the sequel, <i>Idoru</i>. I'm on page 28 and we've already had digital fingerprints and how they tie into algorithms, TMZ and deepfake porn.<br />
<br />
Basically what I am saying is William Gibson, where is your time machine and can I borrow it please.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-84767724037759846412019-10-12T20:19:00.003+01:002019-10-12T20:19:57.945+01:00National Album DayThis was prepared in response to a friend's request for personal top ten albums on Facebook and it seems like I can't paste it there. I hate Facebook. But I like the thing I made so here it is.<br />
<br />
(all decisions are subject to change within one minute, except <i>Bleed American</i> because I think that'll always be my favourite album)<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg60qMvpd2-wkWJqBZRGfYDVURZu5571JtxACcgNhyphenhyphenluXWnbAOty7PKfHWtWPrvM9gBbso4E5eT0lXk9cJX3tOrIJIgUjNBy0rAcN0bWsjIY0yx7sRIBhfWCDLK7K7HU9qbHweZdQ/s1600/albums.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="748" data-original-width="961" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg60qMvpd2-wkWJqBZRGfYDVURZu5571JtxACcgNhyphenhyphenluXWnbAOty7PKfHWtWPrvM9gBbso4E5eT0lXk9cJX3tOrIJIgUjNBy0rAcN0bWsjIY0yx7sRIBhfWCDLK7K7HU9qbHweZdQ/s320/albums.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-42917552710413528602019-08-18T17:26:00.000+01:002019-08-18T17:26:01.531+01:00The world of tomorrowI finished reading William Gibson's <i>Virtual Light</i> the other day. Originally published in 1993, it successfully predicted:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>augmented reality</li>
<li>drones (armed drones, no less)</li>
<li>Arnold Schwarzenegger's move into politics</li>
<li>a black President of the U.S. (admittedly that one was a popular take in '90s sci-fi, but still)</li>
<li>the rise of couriers and the gig economy, admittedly presented as more a messenger than a delivery service, but hey</li>
</ul>
Not bad for under three hundred pages.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-31467327712749411572019-01-02T00:27:00.002+00:002019-01-07T18:18:04.203+00:00My Top 10 Albums of 2018Listing things makes you appreciate them more, probably.<br />
<br />
EDIT 7/1/19: Updated due to the fact that like an absolute berk I'd forgotten the Decemberists had an album out that I liked last year. Well done me. <br />
<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>10. Neko Case - <i>Hell-On</i><br />
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<br />
<i> </i>9. Idles - <i>Joy as an Act of Resistance</i><br />
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<br />
<br />
8. James - <i>Living in Extraordinary Times</i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
7. Gorillaz - <i>The Now Now</i><br />
<i></i><br />
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<br />
6. The Decemberists - <i>I'll Be Your Girl</i><br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<i> </i>5. Band-Maid - <i>World Domination</i><br />
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<br />
4. Alkaline Trio - <i>Is This Thing Cursed?</i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/_8WSncYS0U0/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_8WSncYS0U0?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
<br />
3. Nao - <i>Saturn</i><br />
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<br />
2. Christine and the Queens - <i>Chris</i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
1. Metric - <i>Art of Doubt</i><br />
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Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-17895872427673602722019-01-01T23:51:00.000+00:002019-01-01T23:51:17.845+00:00My Top 10 Films of 2018Movies! That I saw! That I liked! In an order!<br />
<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
10. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3901826/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Breadwinner</i></a>
(dir. Nora Twomey)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Irish animation studio Cartoon Saloon’s two previous films
(one of which, the delightful <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Song of the
Sea</i>, made it onto my top 10 list a couple of years back) are deeply rooted
in Irish history and mythology.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For
their third offering (albeit one with heavy backing from both Canada and
Luxembourg), they’ve gone off on a completely different tack, adapting a
children’s novel set in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan just before the 2001
war.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It focuses on a family whose father,
Nurullah, is unjustly arrested, leaving the mother, two daughters and infant
son trapped inside because the women can’t venture outside without a male
chaperone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Parvana, the younger
daughter, starts cross-dressing in order to earn money hawking in the market
and buy food while they try to figure out how to bring about Nurullah’s
release, if he’s even still alive.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not the most
obvious subject for an animated film, but its gorgeous craftsmanship helps to
make the bleaker parts of the story more bearable and, more importantly, it
never truly loses hope.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wryly and
wittily commenting on Afghanistan’s lot (a prologue points out how the
country’s location has meant it always seems to be fought over by someone or
other while actual Afghans just try to make do while dodging the bullets), it
also provides breaks via the folklore story Parvana tells her baby brother in
instalments, a story of a young boy tasked with placating a terrible elephant
king terrorising a village.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Animated in
a distinctive cut-out style, these sequences provide a bit of visual and
thematic variation while gradually becoming more entwined with the main movie.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s an elegant,
dignified film that never trivialises its subject but never loses its
optimistic humanity either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’ll be
interesting to see what Cartoon Saloon does next.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
9. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154756/?ref_=nv_sr_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avengers: Infinity War</i></a> (dirs. Anthony and Joe Russo)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve mentioned Marvel Cinematic Universe films several times
in these yearly round-ups, but they’ve never quite made it into the top
10.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s because an MCU film will
always be thoroughly entertaining, but also somewhat homogenised, and rarely feeling
like a film in its own right instead of an episode of the world’s most lavish
TV series.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, weirdly enough, when
they smush nearly every character from every film into one extravaganza, a
coherent and excellent film pops out the other end.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Infinity War</i> may not make the most sense
if you’ve not been keeping up, but happily I have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(If you haven’t, don’t worry – you only
really need to have seen <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Avengers: Age of
Ultron</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thor: Ragnorok</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Captain America: Civil War</i>, both <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Guardians of the Galaxy</i> films, maybe <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Black Panther</i> and arguably <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spider-Man: Homecoming</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Doctor Strange</i> to follow
everything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Easy!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fairness, I think they do a fair job of
recapping but honestly I know this pointless nerd stuff well enough that I
can’t tell any more.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyway, it tells
the tale of big purple alien fellow Thanos, who is understandably concerned
with overpopulation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a thoroughly
logical eco-warrior, he’s decided the thing to do is to gather the six Infinity
Stones, which when combined can do anything you can think of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So he’s going to use them to kill half the
population of the universe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Simple!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(No-one tell him how quickly rabbits breed or
he’ll start doing this every year.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Anyway, since two of these Infinity Stones are currently on Earth (in
Benedict Cumberbatch’s necklace and Paul Bettany’s forehead, specifically),
that’s where the big lilac lug is off to next on his intergalactic jolly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sounds like an excellent excuse for a
punch-up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></i>The smart thing that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Infinity War</i> does is make Thanos the protagonist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s his quest that we’re following, and it
makes a clear throughline for a movie that has *counts* nineteen starring
actors listed on the poster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s also
actually helpful that this is the *counts* nineteenth MCU movie as it means
that whenever we cut to a new scene it’ll be starring people you should in
theory know plenty about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s an
excellent deployment of that most classic of comic book tropes, the big ol’
team-up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By splitting the goodies into
teams of three, we get the delights of Iron Man trying to follow the leaps of
logic deployed by Drax and Mantis, or Thor and Rocket Raccoon unexpectedly
becoming best friends.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For a film about
galaxy-spanning genocide, it’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">really</i>
funny.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in ending on a genuinely
shocking cliffhanger, it proves the MCU is a neat counterpoint to the “too many
cooks” adage.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
8. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6040662/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Children Act</i></a>
(dir. Richard Eyre)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A film based on an Ian McEwan novel starring Emma Thompson
is unlikely to ever be a waste of time, and so it proves here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>McEwan himself provided the screenplay from
his 2014 work focusing on the veteran judge Fiona Maye, a specialist in family
law, who hears the case of Adam, a 17-year-old with leukaemia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He requires a blood transfusion but he and
his parents are refusing as they’re Jehovah’s Witnesses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As he’s so close to his 18<sup>th</sup>
birthday Adam is still legally a child, but the question’s there as to whether
in this case his parents are overruling his best interests on religious
grounds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As Maye, Thompson is
predictably excellent, and upcoming actor Fionn Whitehead does a good job as
Adam, a part that could quite easily go wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The film’s restrained style insulates against the occasionally
melodramatic plotting, and the top-notch cast provide a meaty drama without
easy answers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
7. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2404639/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Happy Prince</i></a>
(dir. Rupert Everett)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A film about the last days of Oscar Wilde is so utterly
perfect a fit for Rupert Everett it’s no surprise to learn this has been a
passion project he’s been trying to get made for over a decade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Happily, the wait was worth it – this is an
excellent film, and a great directorial debut for Everett while he’s at
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Children Act</i>, it’s a little bit of a case of “point talented
actor at perfectly cast role and job’s a good ‘un”, but Everett skilfully
navigates the script’s relatively complex chronologies (there are multiple
flashbacks to different moments of Wilde’s life while the main narrative
advances towards his death) and, importantly, never makes it into a vanity
vehicle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The result is an affecting,
intelligent portrait of a complicated man and a great case of good things
coming to those who wait.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
6. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4686844/?ref_=nv_sr_2"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Death of Stalin</i></a>
(dir. Armando Iannucci)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another film about the death of a very famous man, but one
that’s a bit different to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Happy
Prince</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First off, Stalin croaks it
at the beginning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second off, it’s very,
very funny.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And dark.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But funny.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Iannucci takes the chaos that was caused in the USSR by Stalin’s death
and plays it as the blackest of satires – basically like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Thick of It</i>, except with people getting shot for no reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The brilliant ensemble cast take the
rapid-fire, helter-skelter politics and run with it to its utmost, resulting in
a film that’s as hilarious as it is horrifying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Simon Russell Beale and Michael Palin just about turn in the standout
performances, but everyone’s bringing their A game here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
5. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5649108/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thoroughbreds</i></a>
(dir. Cory Finley)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Last year when discussing the excellent <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Limehouse Golem</i>, I predicted great things from Olivia
Cooke.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was not wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First she cheerfully walks off with Spielberg’s
good-but-not-great <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Ready Player One</i>,
turning a pretty flat love-interest character into the best thing in the film,
then she delivers a delicious Becky Sharp in ITV’s adaptation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Vanity Fair</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in between those two, this little gem
snuck under the radar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here Cooke’s Amanda,
an American teen with a still-under-diagnosis condition that means she doesn’t
really have emotions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She reconnects
with an old childhood friend, Lily (Anya Taylor-Joy) as her tutor, but the pair
eventually start re-bonding and quickly become each other’s enablers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which is a problem as Lily loathes her
stepfather and starts to wonder if she can enlist Amanda’s help to bump him
off.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Taylor-Joy’s
another up-and-coming star who always puts in the best of performances, and
teaming her and Cooke up is an icy delight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The script from first-time director Finley’s also great – interestingly,
it was initially intended for a stage play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While you can see its theatrical roots in its small cast and few
locations, it’s certainly filmic, with some fantastic tracking shots wandering
round Lily’s house.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it has what
might be the best sequence in cinema this year, which consists solely of a slow
zoom in on a sleeping character with some sound effects in the background.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I was going to
make a “too many Cookes” joke here but then I realised I’ve already done it.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
4. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4925292/?ref_=nv_sr_2"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lady Bird</i></a> (dir.
Greta Gerwig)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another excellent film about teenage life from a first-time
director, but this one has a much warmer heart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Gerwig, long established as an excellent actor and writer, proves she’s
no slouch behind the lens here (seriously, what is it with 2018 and brilliant
first-time directors?) with this utterly charming tale of a thoroughly ordinary
life.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gerwig’s said
something along the lines of “none of this happened, but it’s all true”, and it’s
a very neat summation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Focusing on a
year in the life of one Christine McPherson, who insists on being called Lady
Bird with all the misplaced determination of adolescence, it feels very real
indeed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lady Bird (Saoirse Ronan, who
must have the best agent ever because I have literally never seen her in a film
that wasn’t excellent) is coming close to graduation and desperately wants to attend
a fancy university at a “city of culture”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She navigates boyfriends, friends and a very fraught relationship with
her mother (the always-brilliant Laurie Metcalfe, excelling even more than
usual here) with a level of self-absorption that should be offputting but
instead comes off as very honest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Given
that Gerwig lived in Sacramento (the city the film’s set in) growing up,
graduated in 2002 (the year the film’s set) and went off to study in New York
(guess how the film ends), it’s hard not to see this as a disguised
autobiopic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that means it does,
indeed, feel very true.</div>
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3. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5027774/?ref_=nv_sr_3"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri</i></a> (dir. Martin McDonagh)</div>
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<br /></div>
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Another film with a protagonist that you occasionally want
to throttle, but one with a darker, sadder story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mildred Hayes is a woman whose daughter was
raped and murdered; as the time drags on with no sign of a culprit, she hires
out three billboards near her house castigating the police chief over the lack
of progress in the case.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The move keeps
public interest in the case alive, but makes her many enemies in the town.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mildred is a woman
made flinty by her experiences – you understand her anger but you don’t always
condone it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She’s played by Frances
McDormand because of course she is; McDormand’s astonishing because of course
she is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The surrounding cast wisely don’t
try to upstage her, and the resulting honesty of the film’s central performance
keeps you hooked through the occasionally unlikely plot points.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Add in a dash of McDonagh’s trademark jet-black
humour and you’ve got another great film in a year filled with superbly
well-rounded protagonists.</div>
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2. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7905466/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">They Shall Not Grow Old</i></a> (dir. Peter Jackson)</div>
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<br /></div>
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It feels kind of crass to put a film like this in a top 10
countdown but I am nothing if not crass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So here’s Jackson’s astonishing documentary/filmic archaeology project.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jackson’s long been a proponent of the
cutting edge of film tech, even when no-one else cares (hi, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Hobbit</i>’s high frame rates!) and he’s
here yoked his technical and artistic eye for a special work to mark the 100<sup>th</sup>
anniversary of World War I’s end.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The film consists
entirely of photography and film captured in and around the front lines of the
war – the original black-and-white footage has been given as thorough a
clean-up as is possible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First of all,
the flaws in the prints have been corrected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Plus, it’s been colourised – but the real trick is to do with, yes,
frame rates.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The original footage ran at
13 frames per second, resulting in the jerky footage we all associate with very
old film clips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here’s where Jackson’s
technical obsessions come in, as he and his crew have painstakingly created and
inserted additional frames, pushing the frame rate up to the standard of 24 per
second.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The result, when added to
judiciously placed sound effects, makes the footage feel, well, real.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And all the more astonishing and devastating for
it.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, happily,
Jackson’s artistic side has come out too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He’s made the wise decision to avoid a narrator or indeed impose any
narrative lines to artificially order things – what we get is audio clips,
captured by the BBC and the Imperial War Museum, from interviews with
soldiers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The one genius addition is to
hire lip readers to work out what the soldiers were saying as they were being
filmed, then have some actors lip-sync to the footage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And that’s all that’s needed, just the remarkably curated footage and
the voices of those who were there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s
an incredible, moving piece of work.</div>
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<br /></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1856101/?ref_=nv_sr_1">
</a></span></span></span><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1856101/?ref_=nv_sr_1"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Blade Runner 2049</i></a> (dir. Denis Villeneuve)
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<br /></div>
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That’s right, I’m so crass that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">They Shall Not Grow Old</i> loses its top spot to a film that wasn’t
even out in 2018.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sorry, but I didn’t
see this in cinemas in 2017 and <a href="http://www.farnhammaltings.com/">my local arts centre</a> showed it in February (on
Valentine’s Day, for whatever hidden meanings you can discern there) so it
counts for my 2018 list.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t really rate
the original <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Blade Runner</i>, which I
know is heresy for a film nerd and a nerd nerd, but there we are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s, you know, fine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But this belated sequel I unexpectedly adore.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thirty years on
from Rutger Hauer talking about the weather, we meet K, a replicant (robot, for
those of you not following at the back) blade runner (someone who tracks down
renegade robots, keep up) who stumbles across something that should be
impossible – the skeleton of a replicant that seems to have given birth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s quickly sent off to track down this unfeasible
issue, in a quest that will almost certainly see him bump into Harrison Ford on
the latter’s latest round of reviving his classic ‘80s roles.</div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is not a film
that should work – a twenty-five-years-later sequel to a film that didn’t
especially ask for a sequel in an era where seemingly every film must be part
of a lengthy sequence or based on something else or a remake of something else
or just BE SOMETHING THAT PEOPLE KNOW BECAUSE PEOPLE DON’T LIKE NEW THINGS
DAMMIT, it probably should have crashed and burned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, it’s a gripping, thoughtful,
beautiful piece of work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Quite apart
from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">finally</i> getting Roger Deakins
his Best Cinematography Oscar, it succeeds in the two key aims of science
fiction cinema – it’s thrilling, with great action sequences, and it’s
thought-provoking, with K (who, as a taciturn creation of few words but deep
feeling, is inevitably but excellently played by Ryan Gosling) considering his lot
in robo-life as a tool with a personality (neatly paralleled by the fact he has
a virtual girlfriend, a hologram, who as an artificial life-form’s artificial companion
has even more questions about her own existence if it can be called that).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The one weak link is Jared Leto’s weird,
ineffectual villain – a blind Steve Jobs with a Jesus complex – but that doesn’t
stop this film being so good it’s the best film in a year it didn’t come out
in.</div>
Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-23143172371777567532018-08-15T21:00:00.002+01:002018-08-15T21:00:39.375+01:00Further evidenceSeriously, look at her go! Even if having a five-stringer is slightly cheating in my eyes.<br />
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<br />Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-56488383283989646162018-08-15T20:45:00.004+01:002018-08-15T20:45:56.499+01:00Slappin'Under recent evidence, I think Misa from Band-Maid may actually be the best bassist working in rock at the moment. Observe.<br />
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<br />Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-13036050921574468482018-04-26T18:49:00.002+01:002018-04-26T18:49:47.764+01:00Sinny maI think this month might be the most I've ever been to the cinema.<br />
<br />
Week 1: 2 movies (<i>Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri </i>and <i>The Post</i>)<br />
Week 2: 1 movie (<i>Mary and the Witch's Flower</i>)<br />
Week 3: 1 movie (<i>Ready Player One</i>)<br />
Week 4: 2 movies (<i>The Shape of Water</i> and <i>Rampage</i>)<br />
<br />
For the record, <i>Three Billboards</i> is the best. Well, I'm actually seeing<i> Rampage</i> in an hour but I suspect it won't be as good. Still, you never know...Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-57432228408436578732017-12-31T17:45:00.001+00:002017-12-31T17:45:30.486+00:00My Top Ten Games of 2017And with this, I've run out of ideas for lists.<br />
<br />
10. <i>Uncharted: The Lost Legacy</i><br />
Tried all the <i>Uncharted</i>s except <i>4</i>, never got what the fuss was. This, on the other hand, is a delight.<br />
<i> </i><br />
9. <i>Horizon Zero Dawn</i><br />
Not actually got as far in this as I probably should have, because I keep getting distracted by making pretty pictures in the photo mode. Still great when I remember to play the actual game though.<br />
<br />
8. <i>Persona 5</i><br />
Not got that far in this either (I think I'm getting giant-game-fatigue), but what I have played tells me this is special.<br />
<br />
7. <i>Resident Evil VII: Biohazard</i><br />
<a href="https://deliciousblogging.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/resident-evil-7-post-mortem.html">Discussed this already</a>. tl;dr - it's a welcome return to <i>Resi</i> of old, made fresh by the first-person perspective.<br />
<br />
6. <i>Sonic Mania</i><br />
Several levels are too long, about half the bosses are shite and more new designs would have been welcome. But my goodness it's wonderful to have a properly, indisputably brilliant new <i>Sonic</i> game.<br />
<br />
5. <i>Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony</i><br />
The fact that - gasp! - all the minigames are both comprehensible and enjoyable means that gameplay-wise this is the best <i>Danganronpa</i> yet. Plotting's as excellent as ever, to the point that not even learning who the evil mastermind was before I started playing it didn't ruin it for me.<br />
<br />
4. <i>Prey</i><br />
Not quite as good as it should have been, but it has moments of brilliance, superlative world-building and is filled with more original ideas than it knows what to do with.<br />
<br />
3. <i>What Remains of Edith Finch</i><br />
Aptly described by some matey on Twitter as "<i>WarioWare</i>, but emotional", this game never stops pulling you up short. The cannery sequence will linger in my mind for years to come.<br />
<br />
2. <i>The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild</i><br />
Nintendo give the open-world concept a whirl and of course they master it straight off. The most innovative <i>Zelda</i> since the first one - maybe the best?<br />
<br />
1. <i> Life is Strange: Before the Storm</i><br />
A prequel to a game that didn't need one by a completely different development team with none of the original voice cast returning. This should have been wretched. But it's absolutely brilliant and brings out more subtleties in the original game. The sequence where you act in a production of <i>The Tempest</i> is my gaming moment of the year.Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31176470.post-74498623908424093222017-12-31T11:31:00.001+00:002017-12-31T11:31:28.259+00:00My Top Ten Albums of 2017Yes.<br />
<br />
10. <i>Concrete and Gold</i> - Foo Fighters<br />
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<br /> 9. <i>The Amazons</i> - The Amazons<br />
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<br /> 8. <i>Whiteout Conditions</i> - The New Pornographers<span class="text_exposed_show"></span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 7. <i>Still Hungry</i> - DJ Format & Abdominal</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 6. <i>Everything Now</i> - Arcade Fire</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 5. <i>Hug of Thunder</i> - Broken Social Scene</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 4. <i>Just Bring It</i> - Band-Maid</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 3. <i>Migration</i> - Bonobo</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 2. <i>Music from Before the Storm</i> - Daughter</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /> 1. <i>Something to Tell You</i> - Haim</span><br />
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<span class="text_exposed_show">(I should point out that Daughter track's probably the weakest on the album but the only one I could find in full on the YouTubes.) </span>Samhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12241181932377509765noreply@blogger.com0