Braveheart (1995)

Posted on September 19, 2014 by badblokebob

I figured I ran the risk of affecting the outcome of the Scottish independence referendum if I posted this review yesterday (because of course I have that kind of reach and influence), but after Mel Gibson’s historical(ly-dubious) epic wound up on my 2014 WDYMYHS list, it seemed too good an occasion to miss. So whether Scotland is about to become independent or not, here are my thoughts on a movie that hopefully didn’t actually influence anyone’s vote…

I say that because Braveheart, for thems that don’t know, is the Oscar-winning story of William Wallace (Mel Gibson), a Scot who led a rebellion against English rule and King Edward ‘Longshanks’ (Patrick McGoohan) at the end of the 13th Century. That much, at least, is true — I think. Y’see, Braveheart has been described as “the least accurate historical epic of all time”, its plot and subplots riddled with changes that go above and beyond the usual tweaks needed to make a coherent narrative out of a true-life tale. You don’t have to dig very hard on the internet to find those errors catalogued, so I’m going to set them aside: this is a movie, not a history lecture; and while I can completely understand the frustration its inaccuracies must provoke in those who’d rather see the truth on screen, it’s not as if rewriting the past is anything new for dramatists (to stick with Scottish examples, Macbeth — resplendent as it is with cold regicide and prophetic witchcraft — is based on history), and we can (should?) view it as an entertainment rather than an education.

Judged as that, Gibson’s three-hour (near as damn it) movie is a pleasingly traditional epic. Many big films these days are just long, but the story here has scope too — it’s about a war, essentially. And war means battles, which are a particular highlight. The standout is surely the famed Battle of Stirling Bridge — you know, the one where the Scots moon the English. Funny and all, but just a small part of a larger sequence. Gibson has the confidence to show the build-up to the fighting, outline the tactics that will be used, and only then launch into the fray. It’s this measured approach that makes it so effective, rather than the crash-bang-wallop straight-to-the-slaughter style of more recent movies. Due to its notoriety I’d assumed the aforementioned clash was the film’s climax, but it’s actually the centrepiece, pretty precisely in the middle of the film. Fortunately there’s enough else going on (because this isn’t actually An Action Movie) that it doesn’t make things feel lopsided.

A big plus comes courtesy of the era the film was made in. It’s the mid-’90s, still a few years away from “let’s use CGI for everything!”, so it was all done ‘for real’. That means great sets and location builds, stunning scenery that’s beautifully photographed, and swathes of extras in the battles. There’s something much more viscerally exciting about watching a few hundred men run at each for real than watching a few hundred thousand polygons do it. The downside of the aforementioned era is some occasionally dated direction, in particular at least one sequence that goes overboard with the slow-mo, but almost everything becomes dated with time — it’s not as bad as, say, Robin Hood with a mullet from Prince of Thieves.

It also doesn’t suffer from that film’s accent issues. Mel Gibson isn’t an American-Scot (or an Australian one), instead delivering an accent that sounds passable to this Englishman. He believed he was too old for the part, which may well be true, but when the rest of it is so inaccurate what does that matter? He’s a solid leading man and a commanding-enough presence. The supporting cast are an array of recognisable Celtish faces — including at least one Irishman playing a Scot and a Scot playing an Irishman — and, because they’re from our fair isles, of course they’re all brilliant. Best of all, however, is Patrick McGoohan. He makes for a fantastic Evil King, given some juicy lines that are even juicier thanks to his delivery. He may not be moustache-twirling-ly memorable like an Alan Rickman creation, but any scene is enlivened by his presence.

Interestingly, Braveheart’s Best Picture Oscar win was the only time it took that gong — no other award or critics group saw fit to deem it 1995’s best movie. So what’s wrong with it? Well, that’s hard to pin down precisely. It’s a little politically simplistic, with the Bad Oppressive English and the Good Honest Scots, including inventing all sorts of stuff to sway the arguments in both those directions. Plenty of old-fashioned epics do exactly the same thing, but I guess by the ’90s we were demanding a little more nuance. The same can be said of the characters — there’s nothing wrong, but aside from Gibson’s grandstanding speeches and McGoohan’s first-class villainy, the only really memorable turn is from the morally-troublesome camply homosexual prince — and that’s a whole can of representational worms.

Then there’s that issue of historical accuracy. I know I said we should ignore it, but even if you accept fiction films shouldn’t be slavish history lessons (and not everyone does), how far can they ignore the facts? Often with such films the viewer assumes they’re true until someone says, “actually, I think you’ll find in reality…” Not so with Braveheart: you don’t have to know anything of Scottish history to guess that the face-to-face chats (and more, wink-wink-nudge-nudge) between Wallace and the future-Queen must be almost entirely poppycock (and, in fact, you can drop that “almost”).

How much that matters — indeed, how much any of those issues are a problem — will vary from one viewer to the next. For some, Braveheart goes beyond the pale. It does make for a rollickingly good story, though.

Braveheart was viewed as part of my What Do You Mean You Haven’t Seen…? 2014 project, which you can read more about here.

The Battle of the Somme (1916)

Posted on September 7, 2014 by badblokebob

2014 #71
Producer: William F. Jury* | 74 mins | DVD | 1.33:1 | UK / silent (English)

Arguably the most famous clash of the First World War, the Battle of the Somme lasted four-and-a-half months from July to November 1916 and, with over a million men wounded or killed, is “one of the bloodiest battles in human history.” As the BBC’s History website puts it, although it was “intended to be a decisive breakthrough, the Battle of the Somme instead became a byword for futile and indiscriminate slaughter”. Not that you’d guess it from this contemporary documentary, which is essentially a propaganda piece produced by the British government.

Centred around 1st July 1916, the day of the first British assault on the German trenches, the film mostly covers the build-up and aftermath of the initial fighting — despite the title, there’s very little footage of combat. There’s probably two reasons for that: one, the footage of the battle wasn’t very good and so, infamously, was staged (aka faked) later; and two, the battle was a bloodbath, making it a somewhat inappropriate spectacle to show to the general public, especially when it was their friends and relations being slaughtered on “the worst day in the history of the British Army” (they suffered around 60,000 casualties on that first day alone). Not that we’re spared the sight of dead bodies elsewhere in the film, but the moment of death itself is another matter.

The faked footage of men going ‘over the top’ has dogged the film’s reputation to a degree. As Roger Smither, the keeper of the Imperial War Museum’s film & photograph archives, notes in the booklet accompanying their DVD release, “despite a common perception that The Battle of the Somme is ‘full of fakes’, the staged ‘over the top’ scene is in fact a significant anomaly in a film that is otherwise characterised by nothing worse in the way of fabrication than the kind of ‘photo-opportunity’ arrangement that remains a continuing part of television news and photo-journalism to this day.” It’s also one that lasts only a few minutes, if that; a tiny fraction of the entire film.

The British press certainly believed they were seeing “the real thing at last” (the Manchester Guardian), feeling it showed “war, grim, red war; the real thing” (the Daily Sketch). The British public agreed, flocking to see the movie en masse: twenty million admissions were sold in the first six weeks of release. At the time, the battle still raged (the film debuted on 10th August 1916) — as Smithers notes, “to its original audience, the film was not history but a despatch from the front”. It is such an historical document now, but at the time it wasn’t even recent-history — it was produced as newsreel, a record of current events, designed to make people at home feel connected to the everyday lives of their family, friends and countrymen serving on the frontline.

It can still serve that role today, to an extent. From much of how World War One is presented in modern fiction, documentary and education, you’d be forgiven for thinking troops were shipped directly into trenches, went over the top and died or, if one of the few lucky enough to survive, then went directly to hospital/home/back to the trench. The Battle of the Somme puts lie to that from the start: we begin with preparations for the battle, lines and lines of troops marching or standing around waiting for something to do, in normal-looking fields and towns, far removed from the cramped, muddy, horrid trenches of our imagination. Smiling faces follow the camera, running around to remain in shot, lifting tarps uninvited to helpfully show off stacks of ammunition. It’s all very jolly.

Equally striking is the scale of the operation. You know it was a monumental effort, but actually seeing so many men… You never see that scope in dramas because they don’t have the budget for all those extras, I guess, but here the crowds of soldiers just waiting around are remarkably large. And crikey, the heavy artillery! Even though you know these were real weapons, today they look more like some fantastical steampunk creation, so covered are they in rivets, and so damn huge.

Signs of disruption to the happy masses creep in, though: it’s surprising how scruffy the uniforms are — not when the soldiers are at rest, but while performing duties like reloading guns. Hats are at odd angles, some are jacketless — just a general lack of the smartness you’d expect to see in an official documentary about the military. Later, we see a gaggle of smiling and laughing faces as men attach special barbed wire cutters to the end of their rifles. Hindsight lets us know few of those men would’ve got close enough to need them.

But there’s no hindsight here; no mention of the incompetent strategy and the severe loss of life it led to. If anything, it makes even the post-battle front look not-so-bad. We see some of the wounded, but they’re either walking or seem to be enjoying a nice stretcher ride, the intertitles informing us we’re seeing “how quickly the wounded are attended to”. Even the captured enemy look just as chipper as the British soldiers escorting them. When we do see action, any British attack is successful and described with words like “glorious”, while any German counterattack is “one of five unsuccessful” ones. It’s brazenly propagandistic. Towards the end we’re shown — and I quote the intertitle accurately — “some of the booty”! (That being artillery, etc, salvaged from the captured German lines.) The closing section opens with shots of devastation wrought on the landscape by British shellfire, accompanied (in the 1916 musical medley) with triumphant music. The tone is shocking.

Speaking of the music, the Imperial War Museum DVD release offers up a choice of two scores: a newly-commissioned (in 2008) one by film composer Laura Rossi, and a recreation of the kind of music that would have accompanied the film in 1916. The film’s producer and distributor, William F. Jury, was also the editor of trade paper The Bioscope, and had columnist J Morton Hutcheson draw up a list of suitable pieces to be performed alongside screenings, which was published days before the film’s release. To quote Dr Toby Haggith (the Imperial War Museum’s film programmer), again in the DVD booklet**, “for this reason, it may be fair to describe this medley as the ‘official score’ for the film. Although cinemas were not obliged to use these recommendations, we know that it was used in at least seven of the cinemas where the Somme film was screened and there is other evidence that it was widely adopted. However, the point is not that the Morton Hutcheson medley was used on every occasion The Battle of the Somme was shown, but that it is the kind of selection that was typical for this film”.

Rossi found the “medley was much more positive and light-hearted than I imagined… I think it’s interesting to hear the medley and see how it was watched in 1916… but I think someone watching the film today would watch in a totally different way, as we can now look back in hindsight, and we have a pre-conceived idea of what the war was like”. This is partly why I chose to view the film with the 1916 soundtrack: to get an idea for how the film was originally perceived, rather than the laden retrospective view. Rossi avoided listening to other scores when composing her own, preferring to respond to just the film itself. Admirable, and probably the ‘right’ way to do it; but it also brings all that associated baggage of “this was a terrible thing”, whereas the original film, produced as propaganda-newsreel, is going for more “this is hard but honourable”. The 1916 music selection is indeed quite jovial on the whole, though marginally more somber when the occasion calls. The (very small) sampling I listened to of Rossi’s score was more ominous, rumbling, haunting and haunted — much more in tune with our modern understanding, I’m sure.

Haggith summarises many of Hutcheson’s choices as “motivated wholly by the needs of propaganda… jaunty, martial and unashamedly heroic. Given the nature of the scenes recorded and the bloody history of this phase of the battle, the selection of such upbeat music seems deeply inappropriate.” However, other selections “reflect Hutcheson’s personal response to scenes that he found distressing on a universal level, and which led him to warn musicians that ‘they must realise the seriousness and awfulness of the scenes’… These contradictions suggest that Hutcheson had difficulty selecting music for the film because he was torn by the contrasting images and messages it conveyed. In this way the medley highlights the tension at the heart of the film.” Musician Stephen Horne, who leads the 1916 medley recreation, agrees that the film is torn “between a sense of propagandist duty and a desire to honour the reality that had not evaded the camera’s gaze.” It’s true that, however positive the final movie wants to be, it can’t completely escape reality. At one point it cuts abruptly from a jauntily-scored scene of men happily receiving post to “German dead on the field of battle”. A deliberate juxtaposition of happiness with the fate that awaits them with near inevitability? Seems a bit radical for a propaganda piece…

As a whole, The Battle of the Somme offers little atmosphere or sense of narrative; just the presentation of a series of broadly-chronological tableaux that the cameramen captured. Even the intertitles only describe what exactly the following shots will be showing us, almost like an onscreen footnote or picture caption. This is formative documentary making, and that apparent simplicity only adds to its veracity: because it seems so determinedly unstaged, we believe it must be real.

But it can’t avoid drawing parallels: the film ends almost as it began, with artillery being moved up for the next assault and men marching to the front, waving merrily as they go. History repeats — probably not the lesson a propaganda film wants to impart, but one it can’t quite escape. And one that, even a hundred years later, we can’t quite learn.

This review is part of the World War One in Classic Film Blogathon, which you can read more about from hosts Silent-ology and Movies Silently.

In that spirit, you might be interested in my reviews of certified-classic Lawrence of Arabia and Stanley Kubrick’s anti-war diatribe Paths of Glory; or, for World War One in modern film, my pieces on the very good Canadian melodrama Passchendaele, and Steven Spielberg’s exceptional, epic adaptation of War Horse. Plus, if you want to really push the definition of “films about the First World War”, there’s always Sucker Punch.

* There’s no credited director. As well as producer Jury, the full credits include cameraman and editor Geoffrey H. Malins, cameraman J.B. McDowell, and editor Charles Urban. ^

** Believe it or not, I’ve avoided quoting too heavily from the Imperial War Museum’s DVD booklet in this review. It’s filled with insights, into not only the film but also its different musical scores and the in-depth restoration process, that make it an enlightening read for anyone interested. ^

Zero Dark Thirty (2012)

Posted on February 25, 2014 by badblokebob

2013 Academy Awards
5 nominations — 1 win

Winner: Best Sound Editing (tied with Skyfall)
Nominated: Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing.

I was going to, in the run up to this year’s Oscars, post a series of reviews looking back at last year’s Best Picture nominees. Unfortunately the viewing for that didn’t really come off (February’s been dismal all round, as you’ll find out in a few days in the monthly update) — but I did manage one, and here it is:

The writing and directing team from The Hurt Locker reunite for another perspective on the last decade-and-a-half-(almost)’s ‘War on Terror’. They set out to make a film about the CIA’s decade-long failed search for Osama bin Laden… and then he was found, immediately leading the film to be restructured as the story of the CIA’s decade-long successful search for Osama bin Laden.

The film focuses on Maya (Jessica Chastain), a fresh CIA agent in Pakistan who, in 2003, latches on to a piece of information about a messenger. No one else has much interested in this lead, but she pursues it for the next however-many years, most of the time getting nowhere — until eventually it results in something concrete…

Zero Dark Thirty feels like a dispassionate film, a characteristic that has debatable merits. The goal is clearly to present an objective, fact-driven account of how the CIA eventually found their most-wanted target, but how successfully it does that has been called in to question multiple times: there were those who felt it justified the use of torture, and those who claimed its facts were all wrong. On both these facts, any one viewer’s mileage might vary. I don’t think it defends torture, but nor does it condemn it — just as bad, in some people’s eyes. Do the agents in the film get information from torture? Some — but by no means all, and the quality of what little they did get is queried by other characters. I don’t think the film is pro-torture, but by trying to be objective and not really criticise the torture and torturers either, it doesn’t go in the direction some would wish it did.

As for the veracity of the facts, I have no idea. Nothing seems implausible. And when condensing eight years of a manhunt into around two hours of screen time, of course some details will be lost, or truncated, or slightly modified to support the flow. I think those who allege the film is poppycock are accusing it of more than minor tweaks, but nonetheless, that’s inevitably part of the process. What’s perhaps most interesting is it hasn’t whitewashed the facts to make a film that feels like A Movie — this isn’t a relentless thriller-shaped eight-year chase, but a more methodical, occasionally messy, real-life-like quest for information.

For me, that worked. It takes a little time to get going, to settle down into its rhythm and to let us identify the important characters, but once it does that, it’s suitably gripping. Not in a nail-you-to-your-seat way like, say, a Bourne film, but in an ever-more-engrossing fashion. It can feel a bit like watching a drama-documentary, however, because there’s very little investment in the characters. There are maybe two or three brief scenes in the entire thing where we’re invited to identify with these people, or even consider them as people, with emotions beyond the methodical drive for information. Some people will hate that, but I don’t think Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal really want us to focus on the human toll of this almost-never-ending investigation, they just want us to follow what happened. The focus is on how it was done, not the people who did it.

This carries through to the final half-hour (or so), which is a near-real-time rendition of the Navy SEAL mission to invade bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan. The unit assigned to the task turn up and get on with it — like the rest of the characters, they are no more than sketches. I read a review that asserted this is where the film’s focus should have been — on who these men were, what their home lives were like, on their training for the mission, and what effect it had on them after. All of which are valid points for a film, but that’s not what Zero Dark Thirty is trying to be.

When we see the mission executed, it feels like a well-researched and detailed recreation of what happened — who moved where and when, how the building was entered, who got shot, etc — rather than asking us to identify with what these characters are thinking or feeling. Nor does it really seek to elicit too much emotion from the audience — it’s not forcing events into a standard action sequence template, with split-second cutting and a thudding soundtrack; it’s not trying to create tension and excitement, or at least no more than is inherent in the real events. I think Bigelow is borderline documentarian in her aims throughout the film, here as much as anywhere else. Clearly some people find that cold, or at least it leaves them cold, but I think it works. Would it be a better film if it came loaded with a greater exploration of the characters as people, or with a depiction of the events in more regular Thriller terms? I’ll let you know when someone makes that film.

The one other criticism I do agree with is that we don’t see enough of the SEALs’ preparation. They built a full-scale replica of the compound and trained on it — was that not worth putting on screen? I know this is the story of Maya and her investigation, not the SEALs and their assault, but I think a bit of time could have been spent on that fascinating aspect of the raid. On the bright side, there’s a sequence where our characters collect their still-in-development super-top-secret stealth helicopters from Area 51. Yes, really. I guess that must be true, because without the reality-claim of the previous two hours it would come across as Independence Day-level sci-fi!

I imagine debates about the moral stance and veracity of its facts will continue to dog Zero Dark Thirty, as well as the question of whether its too emotionless. For me it nonetheless made for an effectively modern and realistic take on the spy thriller.

In the UK, coverage of the 86th Annual Academy Awards is on Sky Movies Oscars from 11:30pm on Sunday 2nd March 2014.

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Posted on December 16, 2013 by badblokebob

In tribute to the great Peter O’Toole, who passed away on Saturday, today’s review is his defining role, and this year’s very special #100…

If you were looking for the archetype of an epic movie, Lawrence of Arabia would be a strong contender. It has a wide scope in just about every regard, from the desert locations that stretch as far as the eye can see, to the thousands of extras that fill them, to the glorious 70mm camerawork that captures it all, to the sweeping story that also contains a more personal throughline, to the 3½-hour running time.

The film begins at the end, with Lawrence (Peter O’Toole) dying in a motorcycle crash. At his funeral, various people express how they never really knew him. From there, it’s back to the height of the First World War, where Lawrence is performing menial duties for the British Army in Cairo before (in a series of events too incidental to go into here) he’s sent off to Arabia to assess the military prospects of Prince Faisal (Alec Guinness). Instead of merely reporting back, however, Lawrence leads some of Faisal’s men on an impossible mission… and succeeds. Supposed to be the British Army’s liaison with the Arab forces, he more ‘goes native’, leading the Arab troops in successful attacks on the enemy Turks, before considering turning on the British for Arabia’s independence…

And that’s much of the film summarised. But it’s almost besides the point, because it’s in the telling and details that Lawrence of Arabia thrives. For instance, as a war epic you might expect numerous battle scenes, and you get some of those; but the 140-minute first half deals with Lawrence’s journey to meet Faisal and then his first victory, while the second part begins later, after Lawrence has won many significant victories. Director David Lean is concerned more with this unknowable man, how he rose and how he fell, than with the ins and outs of all his triumphs.

As such, the film hangs on the performance of O’Toole. We’re told Lawrence is an enigmatic figure and his depiction arguably supports that — we never fully get inside his head; we’re always observing him. And yet that’s no bad thing, because even as Lawrence’s confidence waxes and wains, as his allegiances shift and alter, we can feel what he wants to achieve, why he thinks he can. He attempts the impossible and succeeds, which is why he later attempts a bigger impossibility, and must leave the pieces to the more level-headed men, who didn’t have his genius but can therefore play the political game better than he.

O’Toole carries us through all this with the skill of a seasoned pro, and yet this was his first major role. No wonder it made him a star over night. He makes every tweak in Lawrence’s attitude plausible; sells both the supreme self-confidence and crushing tumbles to inadequacy. Whatever else is going on, he draws your attention — not harmed by his piercing blue eyes, and looks so beautiful that Noel Coward remarked if he were any prettier they’d have to call it Florence of Arabia.

His command of the screen is even more impressive considering who’s playing opposite him. With hindsight it may be a mistake to have Alec Guinness blacked up as an Arabian prince, but his is not a caricature or cartoon villain. Indeed, Faisal is one of the most respectable men in the film, far more so than any of Lawrence’s British superiors. I said before that no man here outclassed Lawrence’s genius, but that would really be wrong: while he might not share Lawrence’s outward brilliance, Faisal is intelligent enough to hold back, to recognise that Lawrence will do much of what needs to be done, but that someone with a calmer head will need to be there to sweep up afterwards.

Then there’s Omar Sharif. Famed for having one of the greatest introductions in the history of the cinema — and one of the longest — there’s much more to his character than that sequence. At first Lawrence’s apparent enemy, he becomes perhaps the closest thing he has to a friend, before it disintegrates again. Such is the volatile nature of Lawrence’s relationship with most of the characters. A psychiatrist could probably diagnose him with some kind of mental health issue.

While those three may dominate, a film of this size has room for many more characters, and — at the risk of just sounding like a cast list — actors such as Anthony Quinn, Jack Hawkins, José Ferrer, Anthony Quayle, Claude Rains and Arthur Kennedy all make a mark, to one degree or another.

A similar legacy is left by those behind the scenes. Maurice Jarre’s score is the reference point for many a period desert epic — indeed, his music is so synonymous with such settings that it has arguably transcended its source to simply be what music for those locations and times is. It graces a film edited with class by Anne V. Coates, where scenes are allowed to play in luxuriantly long takes at times, while at others smash edits throw us from one location to another. This is undoubtedly supported by F.A. Young’s cinematography, where the wide frame can encompass so much action that there’s no need to cut amongst close-ups; and which can show the world in such majesty that you want it to hold for long, lingering takes. Even viewed on the small screen, the 70mm photography shines, especially on Blu-ray.

And, of course, overseeing all that, and surely as attributable for praise as any of those individuals already mentioned, is director David Lean. His ability to marshal a project of his size is unparalleled. To play it out across such a length without it feeling self-indulgent or overplayed is another skill, in part dictated by the material, but no less by the way that material is portrayed. I think, in the face of all this praise, there’s an argument that the film’s size has sometimes run away with. I couldn’t begin to tell you where a cut should be made or an element changed, and I’m not sure I’d presume to even if I had an idea (it was already sliced up once, then restored in 1989). Perhaps it doesn’t actually need changing at all — but on a first viewing, oh my, there’s an awful lot to it!

As with any great film, Lawrence of Arabia is at least the sum of its parts. Replace any of the artists I’ve mentioned, or surely many more, and it would not be the film it is. In fact, when working on such a scale, this is more than a film — it’s an experience. And if that sounds pretentious, well, tough. If you haven’t experienced it yet, try not to leave it as long as I did.

Lawrence of Arabia was viewed as part of my What Do You Mean You Haven’t Seen…? 12 for 2013 project, which you can read more about here.

This review is part of the 100 Films Advent Calendar 2013. Read more here.

Dr. Strangelove (1964)

Posted on September 29, 2013 by badblokebob

aka Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

There are few things as weird (or, at least, weird in quite the same way) as watching an acclaimed and beloved classic film and… just not getting it. Here’s a paragon of moviemaking; a film that is not only exalted but, crucially, has remained in people’s affections against the forces of age; a thing that has truly stood the test of time… and yet… meh.

As you might have guessed, Dr. Strangelove was such a film for me. It’s not that I thought it was bad, it just didn’t click. I was expecting a comedy, but it took a good 20 to 30 minutes to get going humour-wise. Not sure there are any laughs in that period. Maybe one. After that it was funny in parts, but intermittently and unpredictably. Most of the best bits are quite subtle, though occasionally it explodes into a style that’s quite broad, especially the titular doctor and his final speech. I’m sure this is sacrilege, but I felt like it needed 15 to 20 minutes (or more) cutting out just to get on with things.

At times I wondered if the film might just want to be a straight thriller, but that Kubrick couldn’t escape what he saw as the inherent ludicrousness of the situation. Even if you wanted to try reading the film from that angle, the silly bits are too silly to take the rest seriously. I can’t help but feel this plot was better executed when it was called Fail-Safe. (Though, confession: I’ve not seen that. But I have seen this, and I preferred it.)

On the bright side, it’s beautifully shot, especially anything in the War Room or Ripper’s office, so it looks great on Blu-ray. There’s also sets by Ken Adam, which aren’t as outlandish as his famous Bond work but can be equally as striking, especially (again) the famous War Room.

In the end, I felt like I just didn’t get it. Not that I was watching something bad and I couldn’t fathom why so many people loved it, but that I just didn’t understand what it was I was meant to be seeing. Which is perhaps the same thing. I mean, I can see Kubrick was making an anti-war point at least as much as he was trying to make people laugh, but what do turgid sequences of people reading out numbers and flicking switches contribute to either of those aims? Perhaps the joke is meant to be in how long it goes on for? Like Family Guy. Has anyone ever said Dr. Strangelove and Family Guy are alike before, I wonder? Except I laugh more regularly during Family Guy.

Please don’t judge me.

Dr. Strangelove was viewed as part of my What Do You Mean You Haven’t Seen…? 12 for 2013 project, which you can read more about here.

Rules of Engagement (2000)

Posted on January 10, 2013 by badblokebob

2012 #32
William Friedkin | 122 mins | TV | 2.35:1 | Canada, Germany, UK & USA / English | 15 / R

Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones star in this military courtroom thriller from the director of The French Connection and The Exorcist. Jackson is the commanding officer who may have done Something Wrong during a mission; Jones is the old friend he asks to defend him by finding out The Truth.

Let’s jump straight to the heart of the matter, and arguably the film’s primary flaw, with a bit of trivia from IMDb. (Should you wish to avoid spoilers, skip the quote and the first paragraph after.)

The scene of Sokal viewing and destroying the tape after he sees it proves gunfire was coming from the crowd, was imposed by test audiences according to William Friedkin. The film was supposed to leave ambiguous whether or not [Jackson] did the right thing, depicting what happened through subjective viewpoints and never revealing the objective truth of what occurred.

Which just goes to show why test audiences are a bad idea. Friedkin’s original idea would’ve made a stronger movie, and this explains some of the choices and attempts at ambiguity displayed elsewhere. I thought the flashback Jackson has played more like an imagined version than What He Really Saw, but knowing he was right (from having seen the tape) makes it seem like he’s merely remembering.

That said, most of the time it feels less like the film is aiming for ambiguity and more like it doesn’t know how to guide us well enough in what to feel. Important points aren’t appropriately established, others aren’t appropriately dealt with, and Mark Isham’s score toddles on regardless while important moments slip by, such as the declaration of the final verdict: when it’s announced, the music continues on the “tension” setting for a while before petering out. I know some people hate heavy-handed music in films, but this isn’t that, it’s just misguided.

That’s not all that’s bungled. There’s numerous instances of awkward editing by Augie Hess; a screenplay from Stephen Gaghan that clearly wants to be A Few Good Men (right down to several attempts at conjuring a “you can’t handle the truth” moment) but doesn’t exhibit Aaron Sorkin’s skill; relatedly, Guy Pearce’s prosecutor is disappointing underused (his character just needs more time, especially on his “I’ll only try with good evidence” facet); and the climactic court scenes, Friedkin and DoPs William A. Fraker and Nicola Pecorini go overboard with Dutch angles and chiaroscuro lighting.

There are good ideas in Rules of Engagement, but none of them are given enough weight. Couple that with several weak technical elements and it comes out a disappointment.

Passchendaele (2008)

Posted on December 16, 2012 by badblokebob

Despite winning a bunch of Canadian film awards, this First World War drama seems to have been really poorly received by critics — the Radio Times even saw fit to award it just 1 star! I must dissent, however, because I thought it was very good.

The story concerns a Canadian soldier who is invalided out of the war, returns to Canada to recuperate, falls for a local outcast woman, and eventually returns to the front in time for the titular battle. There’s more to it than that, but I’ll leave that for you to discover. Sandwiched between the two battles, the stuff in Canada makes up the bulk of the film, making this more of a period social/romantic drama than a war film. You could class this bit as a melodrama, something that never seems to go down well with critics, but I don’t think is necessarily a bad thing. In the ’40s, say, that would probably be considered the height of cinema. I appreciate we’re not in the ’40s any more, but that kind of epic feeling is still welcome to some, in the right place. That said, it does get a bit cheesy at times — the climax in particular is a bit heavy-handed with its symbolism.

On the whole, however, the bookending battle scenes are suitably evocative. The opening owes a lot to Saving Private Ryan & co in its style (the film’s relatively low budget makes it look distinctly like something from Band of Brothers), but many things owe their style to many other things, so I don’t think this is a problem either. Besides, that look has become the visual shorthand for This Is A Gritty Real War, that’s all. And besides, the sequence does its own thing with it. It’s quite a chilling, effective opening.

The later scenes at Passchendaele itself have more of their own feel. This is the muddy, rain-soaked First World War, and the fighting is chaotic, brutal, messy. Some have criticised it for not showing the scale of the event, which confused me because I thought it had a grand scale. And even if the scale isn’t big enough, the up-close-and-personal fighting surely gives an indication of what it was like to be there. If you were there, you wouldn’t have got an aerial shot of a huge battlefield with thousands dying, would you.

Serving triple time as star, writer and director, Paul Gross’ work as the latter is very good — see again comments on the battle scenes. Cinematographer Gregory Middleton also gives the Canadian scenes a painterly style, making a pleasant contrast. Gross’ screenplay… well, see the comments on the melodrama again. I think it’s mostly fine; we’ve all witnessed a lot worse — there’s nothing clunkingly bad here. His acting is equally solid.

For all the apparent critical bile you’d expect there to be obvious flaws, like terrible acting, but I really don’t think that’s the case. Again, like with the melodrama, some of it is occasionally a little mannered and some of the smaller roles are a fraction below par; but goodness, I’ve seen much worse performances in bigger roles in much better-regarded films.

Passchendaele may not be an exceptional achievement in cinematic quality, but it is very good and I really don’t see why some have such apparent hatred for it. In its own way it conveys well the lives and horrors of that time, and by being made from a Canadian perspective it offers a slightly different view to the one we normally see. And to be honest, I appreciate a film that remembers and in some way honours those that fought in the First World War — thanks in no small part to the Americans, we’ve had an endless stream of World War Two pictures, but the very particular circumstances of the Great War are less often put on screen. I think Passchendaele does a solid job of rectifying that, at least a little.

This review is part of the 100 Films Advent Calendar 2012. Read more here.

War Horse (2011)

Posted on October 20, 2012 by badblokebob

After decades telling tales from the Second World War, Spielberg moves back a conflict. That said, the BD’s special features make sure to point out this “is not his First World War movie” — it’s just a good tale about a boy and his horse.

Based on the children’s novel by Michael Morpurgo, plus the 2000 stage adaptation that inspired Spielberg to make the film, War Horse follows Joey, a thoroughbred born in 1910s Devon, and his loving owner, Alby. When their farm faces tough times, Alby’s father sells Joey to the army as the Great War starts, initiating a trot across Britain and France that takes in both sides of the conflict over the course of the war.

It might be best to define the film as an epic. It’s a relatively intimate one, focusing in on a handful of characters at a time rather than cutting back and forth between various groups, but the way it does move along several sets of characters, across varied locations, and through a lengthy stretch of time, all command a feeling of a grand story. The special features are right in that it’s not really the story of the war, but what it does show is something of the experience of living through that war, and of the humanity that was still present within it.

I imagine some would level accusations of implausibility, but stranger things have happened in the real world than much of what we witness here. Take a late-occurring scene of British-German co-operation in No Man’s Land, for instance — surely two sides at war would never work together! Well, this is the same war that saw the opposing sides play a football match on Christmas Day, remember? It can’t be denied that there’s factual inaccuracy here (the climax takes place at the Somme in the lead up to Armistice Day in 1918, but that battle was actually fought in 1916), or the occasional heavy dose of sentimentality (it’s directed by Spielberg and co-penned by Richard Curtis — what did you expect?), but I think it carries through these with a scale and heart that is, primarily, entertaining. It is based on a children’s novel and I think aims to be a family film (it should by rights be a PG; my twitter rant on that subject is here), but Morpurgo knows when to treat his audience with respect and at points it certainly doesn’t shy away from the harshnesses of the period.

Similarly, the way the horses are handled seems pretty much spot on. They’re not anthropomorphised, but they definitely develop characters and personality as we follow them throughout the film. Naturally most of the focus falls on the human characters, what with them being the ones who can talk and all that, but Joey is the only character we follow throughout the movie and we’re led to relate to him and his story in a believable way. And I say this as someone who’s not a horsey person. Spielberg reportedly found it tough working with real horses, struggling to get performances from them that matched what he’d seen on stage — unsurprisingly, as those were puppets controlled by well trained and rehearsed humans. Nevertheless, however they went about it (and it was with very minimal use of puppets or CGI), the “horse acting” is solid.

Aiding the sense of the epic is Janusz Kaminski’s cinematography, which is regularly stunning and definitely one of the film’s standout achievements. The beauty of some shots is immediately obvious — he lenses the countryside idyll of Dartmoor in a sweeping fashion, bathed in summer sunlight — but there are striking compositions to be found throughout, be they in close-ups, cavalry charges, horse auctions, battlefield hospitals… There’s often a lovely texture to things too, from the likes of drifting snow or chaff, or the way light streaks across a room. The final scene, fully tinted orange, calls to mind the likes of Gone With the Wind, I presume with full consciousness.

Less remarkable is John Williams’ score. It’s not bad per se, and has its moments, but other times it’s either forgettable or forced (some of the early comical bits are horribly overplayed with whimsical plinky-plonking). For all that, a memorable sequence you’ve surely seen in the trailers — when Joey runs over and through the trenches — is perfectly scored, recalling the action/adventure movie grandeur we all primarily remember Williams for.

As I marked my viewing of War Horse on various websites, it struck me how many negative comments there were. I thoroughly disagree. Not everything has to offer gritty realism, even when it’s dealing with horrendous times and events. Morpurgo, Spielberg and co have conjured a sweeping tale of friendship and humanity in the face of adversity; one that isn’t afraid to depict some of the nastier realities of the world, but in a way that makes them relatable for a younger audience. I think that’s important; but this isn’t a Worthy Film for that, it’s just something it does well. I think it also nails sensations of adventure and, yes, sentimentality.

I think it’s a bit of an epic, with all that connotes, and I love a bit of an epic.

War Horse is on Sky Movies Premiere twice daily until Thursday.

It placed 2nd on my list of The Ten Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2012, which can be read in full here.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)

Posted on August 28, 2012 by badblokebob

2012 #24
Peter Weir | 133 mins | TV | 2.35:1 | USA / English | 12 / PG-13

There are a few Oscar nominees from the ’00s that inspire little desire in me to bother seeing them (I’m certain that’s completely true of every era, but I’ve seen most of the ’00s nominees so I tend to focus on them more often), meaning it’s taking me a very long time to get round to them (maybe I never will). Master and Commander isn’t really one of those — it’s no Seabiscuit or In the Bedroom — but I can’t say a naval inaction film with Russell Crowe held massive appeal. Turns out I was completely wrong.

For starters, it’s definitely not an “inaction” movie. It’s not an action movie in the regularly understood sense of non-stop fights on varying scales, but there are a few stunningly realised naval battles, and other exciting sequences as the hero ship either tries to keep track of or elude their enemy. That’s essentially the film’s plot — one ship after another — and the long chase (they rarely have each other in direct sight) gives it an epic feel, as they chase an almost phantom ship, rather than engaging in regular heated battles.

There’s lots of good detail about what it would be like to live that life, woven in and around the plot. I’m sure this thoroughly thrilled maritime enthusiasts (assuming it’s all accurate), but for those of us whose interests lie elsewhere it still provides a vivid picture. It’s not so much a character picture, although the nature of Russell Crowe’s Captain is surely revealed in the way he goes about his tactics and the nature of his various relationships with various crewmen. Paul Bettany, as the ship’s doctor, is more our point of view: he’s not a naval man and doesn’t always understand their traditions. He’s not a crass audience-cipher in the way such parts often can be, but it does make him identifiable.

This is also the first movie ever to film on the Galapagos Islands, featuring it in an extended sequence in which Bettany — who also happens to be a keen amateur whatever-ist — ventures onto the island to collect specimens of the strange and unusual creatures they see as they sail past. Bettany would later play Darwin in 2009’s Creation, which lends this stuff some kind of odd intertextual significance in retrospect. While it’s an interesting aside from the story — an unusual kind of diversion — it is nonetheless an aside, and perhaps kills some of the momentum. On the other hand, along with some earlier sequences of trading with natives, it lends the film a feel of exploration, of an era when parts of the world — and the people and creatures that inhabited them — were still being discovered, even just by common sailors.

It looks like too many people felt as I did and didn’t turn out to see Master and Commander in big enough numbers: it opened at #2 in the US, grossing just $93.9m on a budget of $150m. It managed $212m total worldwide, but when you consider marketing costs… It was clearly considered quite a pricey proposition, considering it was, unusually, produced and/or released by 20th Century Fox, Universal and Miramax (that makes for a strangely bizarre array of company logos at the start). Despite the fact it’s based on a series of 20 (completed) books, and various people involved have mentioned the possibility down the years, a sequel is so unlikely it seems silly calling it just “unlikely”. And that’s a shame, because this is an entertaining action-drama with likeable characters and an engrossing atmosphere. A little to my surprise, I loved it.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World placed 3rd on my list of The Ten Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2012, which can be read in full here.

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

Posted on April 20, 2012 by badblokebob

The final entry in Marvel’s multi-film campaign leading up to big team-up The Avengers (Avengers Assemble this side of the pond, don’t forget) sees them tackle a big name in comics that hasn’t previously transferred quite as well to the big (or small) screen. And, to jump to the end, it did well: $358.6m worldwide, which is about two-and-a-half times its budget… though still $91m behind the next-highest grossing of Marvel’s new wave, leaving it fourth of the five films.

But box office does not tell of quality, as the highest grossing films of all time surely tells us. That said, rather than fourth I’d probably rank it fifth.

Despite how such a negative start may sound, I didn’t dislike Captain America. In fact, I largely enjoyed it. It was, as I’m sure you know, released the same summer as Thor (that’d be last summer), and they make quite a good pair within Marvel’s little universe. They both begin by grounding the viewer on present-day Earth, before spinning off to a different time and place for a second prologue, before heading off to a third time and place to kick off a different kind of superhero story. In Thor it was a sci-fi/fantasy tale of God-like beings; in Cap it’s a World War 2-era superhero-without-powers. Not to mention the fact that they’re tied together by brief second prologues in the same small Norwegian town and a super-powerful artefact called the Tesseract.

The connections don’t stop there. Some people complained that Iron Man 2 had too little focus on its own story and too much stuff setting up The Avengers. I disagreed, but I’d consider levelling such a criticism at Cap. While it doesn’t do it so overtly as the second Iron Man (this is set around 70 years before Nick Fury will come along with his Avenger Initiative), it feels at times as if it’s drawing together disparate threads from previous films in preparation for the team-up. Sure, most of the film works without knowing the connections — the fact that Cap’s shield cameoed in Iron Man 2, or that the super soldier programme plays a central role in The Incredible Hulk, won’t destroy anyone’s understanding of this — but, having seen those films (as surely most of Cap’s audience will have), it does feel almost as much a prequel to The Avengers as a film in its own right. Maybe the subtitle should’ve given that away.

Even aside from the inter-film connections, the story feels like someone gave the writers a checklist of “bits of mythology you must include” and they battled to shape a story around including them all. This results in a bitty narrative that jumps about, trying to include various WW2-era elements of Cap continuity ready for an ending that sends him to the present day in time for The Avengers. (Sorry if you consider that a spoiler, but I think the fact he’s in The Avengers rather gives it away.) To top it off, they also attempt to leave holes so that a sequel could be set in WW2 too, if so desired. While I appreciate that as an idea — the ’40s setting is a clear marker of why Cap is different to other similar heroes — it’s part of the reason it doesn’t feel like the whole thing quite ties together.

It also has the same problem that the first Iron Man did: there’s a lot of backstory involved in establishing Cap’s origins, leaving the villain to hover around the periphery until he’s needed for the climax. When said villain is Cap’s equivalent of the Joker in terms of significance, it’s a bit of a waste. They should be equals and opposites, and there are attempts to build that in, but the two don’t face off enough for it to really work. They both go about their own business, until they more or less bump into each other a significant way through the film, eventually leading to a climactic battle.

In short, I appreciate the attempts at creating a different structure for a superhero movie, but by trying to avoid the straight-up “hero encounters villain, fights against villain to end” shape of a tale, I think they’ve made something a bit too disjointed. I felt it was a series of shorter narratives connected by being placed end to end, not a single film-length story.

While I’m on things I felt they got wrong, let’s tackle the special effects. There are too many of them, meaning a lot looked quite fake to these eyes. OK, they tell the story just fine, and you might argue it gives a heightened comic-book-y feel, but I feel like I was seeing stuff of this quality six or more years ago, and I don’t believe I should be feeling that way on a movie this big. In fact, to be honest, the first Pirates movie was eight years old when this was made, and that was light-years ahead of this. Now, I think that movie had exceptional effects work, and it was well ahead of the average at the time… but that time was eight years ago. It’s hard to say what exactly is wrong here, but it’s mainly an abundance of CG backdrops, green/blue screen stuff that doesn’t scan. Heck, in one shot you can see a blue glow around the edge of a character’s hair! That’s bordering on the amateurish.

The much-discussed ‘Skinny Steve’ — where effects wizards turned muscly star Chris Evans into a wimpy little guy for the film’s first act — is an intermittently good effect. Sometimes it’s astonishing, the equal of similar work from Benjamin Button; a completely plausible human being. Other times, not so much: in some shots his head is obviously disproportionate, or a character pokes the air when he’s surely meant to be poking Steve’s chest, or he looks oddly squished, or cartoonishly exaggerated… Like all the effects, the makers seem to have overstretched their means/budget.

I know special effects are a means to an end, and we don’t routinely criticise the fakery of back-projection and what have you in Old Movies, but I think the difference is filmmakers don’t have to go as far as they do nowadays. We’ve seen similar shots and scenes and effects that have been done more convincingly, and when lesser versions begin to distract you from the storytelling, there’s something at fault. Whether that’s the effects themselves or something else, like the story not being engrossing enough, is another debate.

Perhaps it was that episodic story, because one of the other main things I got from Cap was a long game of Spot The TV Actor In A Small Supporting Role. So prevalent did they seem that at times I was more focussed on that than anything else. Oops. Still, do look out for Spooks & Robin Hood’s Richard Armitage, Boomtown & Desperate Housewives’ Neal McDonough, The Ruby in the Smoke’s JJ Field, The Tudors’ Natalie Dormer, The Mentalist’s Amanda Righetti, Doctor Who’s Jenna-Louise Coleman, and Scott & Bailey’s Ben Batt (blink and you’ll miss him). There are probably others, but those were the ones I knew. I imagine there are so many Brits in relatively small roles because it was shot over here. Not sure why, but it was.

Of the main cast, Chris Evans is fine as Steve Rogers, a guy so Honourable that it’s almost a thankless role — much like Superman, he’s almost too nice to be interesting. Not as bad as Superman can be, though, because at the start his good intentions surpass his physical means. It’ll be interesting to see how he plays in future films, especially The Avengers, where he’s going to have to face the awesomeness of Tony Stark. But that’s for other films. Romantic interest Hayley Atwell is perfectly up to task. Among the rumoured contenders for the role was Emily Blunt, who I can’t really imagine playing a character so supportive and fundamentally nice (a perfect match for Rogers, then), so I’m glad she didn’t get it. Shame for Atwell they bumped Cap into the future, automatically leaving her out of future franchise entries.

Elsewhere, Tommy Lee Jones could play roles like this grumpy-but-good-at-heart-General in his sleep, but at least claims the film’s best line. Equally, Hugo Weaving could be in a similar state of unconsciousness and give a good villain, and while he does his best to chew the scenery, I thought he was fine but unmemorable in an underused role. As I said, the screenplay positions him as a “we need a villain for a climax”-level enemy when his character should be The Hero’s Nemesis, leaving a waste of both character and actor. Co-villain Toby Jones is similarly ill-treated, although at least he may return, semi-reincarnated as another villain (no explicit clues in the film, but he is one in the comics).

Everywhere-man Dominic Cooper channels Robert Downey Jr and John Slattery to portray a young Howard Stark (Tony’s dad, natch), who had a bigger role than I expected. The rest of the cast appear for fan box-ticking (see my mythology comment), which means they also go underused. There’s only so much room in one film of course, and the focus is rightly laid on Cap’s journey. The small roles given to his team of army mates would have been fine as setup for a sequel, but as it’s been confirmed that Cap 2 will be set in the modern day, once again it’s good casting and character establishment gone to waste. Again, the film is attempting too much.

And I haven’t even mentioned the over-graded sepia hue, because it’s Set In The Past. Digital grading brought much potential to the film industry, but instead it’s pathetically and predictably overused. Whenever you compare a film itself to some B-roll footage in a behind-the-scenes documentary or somesuch, you suddenly noticed how not-like-real-life the film looks. In every thriller whites are actually blue, for instance. Here, I imagine if you compared it you’d find whites are actually bronze. I don’t imagine this kind of thing is going away now though.

I realise I’ve consistently laid into Captain America here. It has good points. I forgot to mention Stanley Tucci, for instance, who as an early mentor for Rogers is vital to the story and well played. There’s also some solid action sequences (eventually), and not too much 3D tomfoolery, and some humour, though not as much as Iron Man or Thor unfortunately. I did, overall, enjoy the film… just not as much as any other in Marvel’s Avengers lead-up. I wound up wondering if it would’ve worked better as a condensed 15-minute pre-titles to that film.

But hey-ho, here it is. Like I theorised at the end of Iron Man, maybe with this setup out of the way they can produce a better sequel… but considering the skinny-little-man-turned-muscly-superhero is one of the more interesting aspects of Cap, and they’ve done that now; and the World War 2 setting is another unique facet, which they’re leaving behind… sadly, I’m not holding out quite as much hope.

Captain America: The First Avenger is on Sky Movies Premiere from today (hence why I’ve reviewed it before Thor).

Avengers Assemble is in UK cinemas from Thursday 26th April. The Avengers is in US cinemas from Friday 4th May, and on various other dates worldwide.

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