Women Talking (2023) - Movie Review

[tw: sexual assault]

In Manitoba Colony, a Mennonite settlement in Bolivia, at least 151 women and children were raped over the course of four-or-so years. An anaesthetic normally reserved for livestock was sprayed in through their windows, knocking everyone inside the houses unconscious. At first, the men of the village attributed the ‘mysterious’ incidents to demonic attacks or possibly being done by Satan himself; in common parlance, once the event broke through the isolated nature of the village and its inhabitants, one name attributed to it was the ‘ghost rapes of Bolivia’.

While this film, and the novel on which it was based, is set with the backdrop of this atrocity, they primarily serve as a dramatic addendum to it. Described on-screen as an “act of female imagination” (a phrase also used to describe the assault itself when the women came forward about a more terrestrial culprit than Christianity's favourite strawman), the story depicts an impromptu council of women from this settlement, who meet up and try to come to a consensus about what they do next. Do they do nothing? Do they stay and fight? Or do they leave?

The Personal History Of David Copperfield (2020) - Movie Review

Given what happened last time we checked in with premium Scottish firebrand Armando Iannucci, this follow-up feels a bit… off. One of the current kings of darker and politically-minded comedy, after taking Stalin’s Russia to task in riotous fashion, decides to make an adaptation of a Charles Dickens novel. This is easily one of the broadest things he’s ever worked on, and at first glance, this feels like he’s actively playing against his own strengths on some form of artistic dare. But even though things have definitely been toned down here, it’s also surprisingly in-line with Iannucci’s aesthetic up to this point.

Mary Poppins Returns (2019) - Movie Review

With 2019 already set as the year for Disney to go full-force in reviving its most beloved stories, today’s film is going to ultimately serve as the bar for what follows. No, this isn’t a straight-up remake of the 1964 original, but with how it’s presented, it might as well be: It’s got pretty much everything I remember from before. The colourful soundtrack full of whimsy-tinged jazz and swing, the respectably subtle lyricism in front of it that helps build the story’s bigger points, an emphasis on reconnecting with the inner child and finding joy in stuff and nonsense, an American doing an obvious Mockney accent; it all fits.

The Danish Girl (2016) - Movie Review

After looking at Tangerine last month, I think that my cinematic perspective on transgenderism has been forever altered as a result. It is also going to serve as an interesting contrast to how the more mainstream film scene treats similar subject matter. Now, since I don’t go too far out of my way when it comes to what films get watched/reviewed around here, I don’t want to take any hoity-toity position when it comes to more independent cinema. That said, I can’t help but feel like subject matter such as transgenderism is better suited for the indie scene; the amount of sensitivity required to make a portrayal of such things work shouldn’t be hindered by any kind of company oversight. Then again, if Any Day Now proved anything, it’s that the indies are just capable of screwing up as the Hollywood system, so this could really go either way.

Suffragette (2015) - Movie Review

The Ridiculous Six (2015) - Movie Review

I hate Rotten Tomatoes. Despite how it’s widely considered to be a good barometer for how good/bad a film is, it’s surprisingly broken if you actually look at the scores. Some of the reviews that are listed as Fresh or Rotten, if you actually look at even the blurbs on the site itself, are extremely arbitrary, the actual overall score is tucked away underneath the big percentage rate, and said percentage only amounts to how many people liked a film vs. disliked a film. Not how much, just whichever way their opinion falls. For a site that’s meant to help show an overall opinion, being misleading is probably the worst thing you can do. However, with that said, they are especially good in one certain area: The 0%; the films that absolutely no-one defended. Given how this illustrious list includes films like C Me Dance, Fred: The Movie, A Thousand Words and Keith Lemon: The Film, easily some of the worst films I’ve ever seen, that integer still carries a lot of weight. So, what does that say when today’s subject is only one of the three released by Happy Madison Productions to have received a 0%? I mean, that’s means that this is even worse than The Master Of Disguise, That’s My Boy and Paul Blart: Mall Cop, among so many others? Is this truly that bad? Time to, reluctantly, find out.

In The Heart Of The Sea (2015) - Movie Review

Moby Dick, much like The Great Gatsby and Homer’s Odyssey, is in the great pantheon of books that you must read before anyone takes you seriously as an adult human… apparently. More importantly, it’s also one of the few literary works that helped turn Khan Noonien Singh into an obsessed psychopath; reason enough to avoid it, I reckon. All the same, it’s in that canon with good reason, since the term “white whale” has become ingrained in the human lexicon and Captain Ahab has been made synonymous with any fictional character in the grips of deep obsession. As such, a film about the purported real-life story that inspired that famous tale is going to be worth at least a gander. Then again, in terms of films about the stories behind the myth, the director this time round doesn’t have the best track record. So, before he resumes work on his next Dan Brown adaptation, let’s look into Ron Howard’s latest epic.

Spectre (2015) - Movie Review

You’d be hard-pressed to find a single film franchise that’s more iconic than the exploits of agent 007. The actors, the girls, the gadgets, the quips, the cars, even the booze; all of it has reached a phenomenal level of cultural relevance. It is almost to the point where, a thousand years from now, future civilisations are going to assume that British people did nothing but drink rocket fuel martinis and snark at each other all day… okay, bad example. What I’m getting at with all this is that, with each new instalment, there is an automatic expectation that comes with them. Now, bear in mind that anything and everything that is said here is from the perspective of a very recent casual fan of the series; hell, the first Bond film I saw in cinemas was Skyfall. To be fair though, that’s a pretty damn good place to start. But how does its sequel turn out?

The Lobster (2015) - Movie Review

I’ve talked before about the high-conceptuality of speculative fiction, but as much as I like it when filmmakers indulge in their more bonkers side, it is perfectly understandable if it repels other, more discerning film-goers away. Even if My Little Pony doesn’t get the same knee-jerk reaction out of me these days as it used to, a certain level of self-awareness is required so as to understand why other people may see you as… odd, to say the least, for watching it. For all our talk about not judging books by their covers, every so often there will be a film that sounds too out there for audiences to apparently take. This is one such occasion, and I will freely admit that the premise had me sceptical about its efficacy as well… then again, I’m sceptical about pretty much every release these days, so this is nothing new. However, I can only hope that by this review’s end, I will have converted at least some people on seeing this film because it deserves to be watched.

Paddington (2014) - Movie Review

When one of the most prominent trailers for your film contains your main character licking earwax from a toothbrush, we can be forgiven for assuming the worst. Add to that that we’re dealing with a film aimed primarily at kids and we’re dealing with a high probability of running from the theatre wanting to burn everything. I have never read any of the original books, and only have marginal knowledge about the character itself; this means that I only had the very disheartening trailer to go on. This is the kind of recipe that results in clouds of thick black smoke, melted lab equipment and possibly the need for several HAZMAT suits. What does this cook up in practice? Let’s dig in and find out: This is Paddington.