Tag Archives: Apple TV+

January’s Failures

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Let’s start this month with a double failure: having missed Poor Things at FilmBath back in October, I now haven’t seen it on its general release either. It’s still screening near me though, so there’s still a chance I’ll temporarily get over my laziness and head out to see it. Certainly, there’s not been much else on the big screen this month to tempt my out of the house. I’m certain that I’ll eventually watch the likes of Jason Statham actioner The Beekeeper, musical remake Mean Girls, and Christmas-themed The Holdovers (oh yeah, smart idea to release that in January), but they’re also the kind of thing I can wait til streaming for. I know, I know, I’m a bad movie fan. Whatevs. Also on the big screen this month — and more-or-less as likely to make my streaming watchlist someday — were Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, biopic One Life, British post-apocalyptic thriller The End We Start From, haunted swimming pool (I shit you not) horror Night Swim, romantic fantasy All of Us Strangers, and another musical remake, The Color Purple.

Shifting to the streamers, I feel like Amazon scored the most-talked-about film of the month with Saltburn. Proof once again that a theatrical release before a streaming debut helps generate views and chatter, because various other direct-to-streaming debuts — Netflix’s Lift; Amazon’s action comedy Role Play — don’t seem to have generated nearly as much buzz. Heck, Netflix debuted a British sci-fi thriller co-written and -directed by Daniel Kaluuya, and I first heard about it from my mum because she’d seen someone interviewed on The One Show. (That was The Kitchen.) When my mum knows about a film like that before me, I feel like the marketing has gone awry somewhere. On the flipside, Disney+ did such a good job of making me aware The Creator was available to stream, it stopped me buying the physical media release. I nearly did anyway (physical is best; support non-franchise movies; etc), but there’s so much other stuff to fork out for nowadays.

That aside, Sky Cinema still dominate for major new-to-streaming releases over here, this month including the likes of Fast X (a rare case of a Fast & Furious movie retaining its original title for the UK release), Jennifer Lawrence R-rated comedy No Hard Feelings, and, um, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts. Yeah, they’re still making live-action Transformers movies; though, after I wasn’t so enamoured with Bumblebee, I might finally be done with that franchise. Plus, having commented in my “Best of 2023” post that I should check out the old Fletch movies, both Fletch and Fletch Lives cropped up amongst a load of additions on New Year’s Day. Normally I’d get Sky’s ‘budget’ version, NOW, to watch the Oscars and thus intend to catch up on these films then, but the awards have now moved to ITV over here. Dilemma. I’ll probably just wait until NOW next offer me a discounted membership. That usually happens around Oscar time anyway.

Next, Netflix rustled up Marvel-adjacent vampire superhero Morbius (as with most superhero movies these days, the idea of watching it feels more like mandatory homework than pleasure; although it’s meant to be so bad, I’m curious), plus Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (I found the first surprisingly enjoyable, so I’m definitely down for the second now it’s ‘free’). Plus, thanks to the addition of Michael Bay’s Ambulance, I noticed they have the Danish original, Ambulancen. I imagine it’s quite different; the contrast could be interesting. And talking of world cinema, I really, really wanted to catch Hit the Road while it was streaming on Channel 4 throughout December and the start of January… but didn’t manage it. “Why didn’t you just watch it if you really, really want to?” Y’all heard of family commitments, and work, and… ugh, December (and early January) can be a right pain.

Talking of pains, Apple TV annoyed me — and many others, based on the social media reaction — back in early December by sending out an alert saying Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon was now available to stream, only for it to turn out they meant it was now available to rent; and at the pricey “still in cinemas” rate of £16, at that. Cheeky so-and-sos. They later did the same thing again with Napoleon, but at least I was wise to it second time round. Anyway, Killers of the Flower Moon is now available as expected — as part of an Apple TV+ subscription — but I still haven’t got round to watching it because it’s over 3½ hours long. That’s not the kind of film you just bung on, is it? You’ve got to find time for that sort of thing, haven’t you? Well, I haven’t yet. It’s a fairly high priority, for reasons that should be self-evident, but still, when have I got 3½ hours?

Back to Amazon for more low-key sci-fi with Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal in Foe, plus acclaimed in-depth (look at its length!) folk horror doc Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched, which I’ve actually owned on disc for… far too long, considering it’s still sealed. That’s as nothing to Decision to Leave, though, which is now streaming on iPlayer, having been on MUBI, and which I’ve bought on disc… twice, because after I picked up the original Blu-ray (fortunately, on offer) they went and announced a 4K one. More fool me, I guess. iPlayer are almost making a thing of streaming movies I’ve recently bought-but-not-watched on 4K, with In the Heat of the Night, The Others, and Thelma & Louise all popping up recently. On the other hand, MUBI might save me some money, as they added “unique take on the neo-noir genre” Suzhou River shortly after Radiance announced a disc release for March. I like supporting boutique labels, but I’ve already blind-bought plenty of Radiance titles — my conscience can withstand one (legal) “try before you buy” (assuming I actually get round to it…)

All this talk of purchases inevitably brings us round to what I did buy this month. It’s felt quiet at times, but the final list looks pretty long. I think that’s in part because several are titles I was expecting in December that rolled over to the new year, for one reason or another (delays in either shipping or getting through the postal system, mainly). The most forgivable are those that had to come from overseas, including 4Ks of Dellamorte Dellamore (aka Cemetery Man) from the US and Possession from Australia (I probably would’ve held out for the forthcoming UK release from Second Sight, if they’d bothered to announce it before I ordered this one). Other 4Ks included Rio Bravo (for Blindspot), Sisu, and Vanilla Sky (which I haven’t seen since its DVD).

From Warner Archive’s burgeoning UK range, I picked up early horrors Doctor X and Isle of the Dead (the latter mainly because I happened to see it reduced), plus Fritz Lang’s US debut, Fury. As is now almost customary, there was martial arts action from Eureka in the form of Kung Fu Cult Master, When Taekwondo Strikes, and Samurai Wolf I+II (the latter meriting inclusion in the Masters of Cinema range). Plus, from 88 Films, The Inspector Wears Skirts. I could more than fuel the Genre portion of my Challenge with new purchases, never mind the massive backlog I’ve got. Oh well.

The most-represented label this month was Radiance — the aforementioned postal/shipping delays meant I got two parcels from them this month, with both December and January releases, including titles from their partner labels. The latter included Palme d’Or-nominated Brazilian crime drama Black God, White Devil; giallo Murder Obsession; and an Italian crime drama that apparently sits at the intersection of gialli and poliziotteschi, Death Occurred Last Night. From the label’s own output there was even more Italian crime in Goodbye & Amen; “a ferocious satire on Japan’s post-war economic miracle”, Elegant Beast; “pitch black neo-noir” I, the Executioner; Cannes Grand Jury Prize-winning marital drama The Sting of Death; and a box set of World Noir, which is excitingly labelled “Vol.1”, and contains examples of the genre from Japan (I Am Waiting), France (Witness in the City), and, once again, Italy (The Facts of Murder). Now, I just need to actually watch some of those before World Noir joins Columbia Noir and Universal Noir as a pile of exciting but unplayed box sets…

April’s Failures

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April saw the first billion-dollar-grossing movie of the year in cinemas, animation The Super Mario Bros. Movie. Mixed reviews make it sound like your typical Illumination fare — slick, colourful, and vacuous — but I’m sure I’ll catch it someday. Elsewise, it seemed like horror was the order of the day, from the likes of The Pope’s Exorcist, Renfield, and Evil Dead Rise. The latter seemed to receive the strongest notices, but also looks terribly hardcore. I don’t know if it’ll be one for my stomach. Not that I’ve even watched the 2013 Evil Dead yet, nor the TV series; and I haven’t seen the original trilogy for so long that they’re well overdue a rewatch too. Maybe at some point I’ll do the whole shebang. Other big screen bows included a belated UK debut for Searching sequel Missing (already out on disc in the US; I’ve ordered it and had expected my copy to be here before the UK theatrical release, but the whole order got held up); the new Makoto Shinkai, Suzume; the new Ben Affleck, Air; and the first half of a two-film French adaptation of the classic swashbuckler The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan. I was pleased to see the latter getting good reviews, because I’ve been looking forward to it since it was first announced a couple of years ago; though I’m going to have to wait for a disc release to actually see it. The second half is apparently due before the end of the year.

The streamers couldn’t really equal such might, despite their best efforts. Apple TV+’s Ghosted was a wannabe blockbuster in every sense: two fairly big stars (Chris Evans and Ana de Armas), a hot director (Dexter “Rocketman” Fletcher), and an audience-friendly comedy-action-thriller-romance premise. Yet somehow it looked like one of those fake movies-within-movies you get when a character is an actor, and reviews suggest the final result isn’t much more convincing. Plus it’s on Apple TV+ — who has Apple TV+? (Besides me.) Disney+ could have fared better with their latest live-action remake, Peter Pan & Wendy, but reviews were middling. It’s helmed by David Lowery, who apparently did a bang-up job of reimagining Pete’s Dragon, alongside his excellent adult-facing features like The Green Knight, and, based on what I’ve read, that’s what saves it from being another mess of a Disney live-action remake. Definitely on my to-see list, but I’m hardly racing right for it. (I’ll probably end up watching it later this week now I’ve said that.) Meanwhile, the best Netflix could muster was TV series sequel/finale The Last Kingdom: Seven Kings Must Die; Sky Cinema snaffled up Zach Braff’s Florence Pugh-starring A Good Person as an “original”; while Amazon Prime’s biggest title was Florian Zeller’s followup to The Father, The Son, which I’ve heard is terrible. But then, they had a super-expensive new spy show to be promoting instead.

Other subscription streaming debuts this month were mostly on Sky, with the likes of Jordan Peele’s Nope (though I already bought that on 4K), Idris Elba vs a lion in Beast, animation DC League of Super Pets, and The Forgiven, a thriller starring Ralph Fiennes, Jessica Chastain, and Matt Smith, which I don’t think got particularly good reviews, but I remember the trailer looked promising. Jumping higher up my watchlist than any of those, however, was Korean action-thriller Hunt. The directorial debut of actor Lee Jung-jae (best known as the lead in Squid Game), it’s about uncovering a North Korean mole in the ’80s. Reviews cite a dense and confusing plot, but that it’s absolutely stuffed with action. Sounds worth a go to me. As for recent-ish fare on other streamers, it was mostly documentaries: on Netflix, David Bowie retrospective Moonage Daydream; and on Channel 4, cinema analysis in Lynch/Oz.

The latter also had perhaps the most interesting catalogue title of the month in The Death of Dick Long. I think you’d be forgiven for not having heard of it, but it’s a film directed by one half of Daniels, i.e. the chaps behind Swiss Army Man and Everything Everywhere All at Once. Unfortunately, I missed my chance to see it. Other titles of note included a Michael Mann I’ve not seen, The Insider, on Disney+, and a Martin Scorsese I’ve not seen, Cape Fear, on Prime Video. The standout title on iPlayer was Blazing Saddles, because it reminds me I owe it a rewatch. It’s a beloved comedy classic, but I didn’t much care for it when I saw it the first time — which was sometime before this blog began, so probably 20 years ago. And talking of a couple of decades, sticking out to me amongst a handful of interesting titles on MUBI was The Warrior, the debut feature from Asif Kapadia (who’s gone on to make more of a name as a documentary director, with the likes of Senna and Amy). I remember buying it on DVD back around when it first came out — in the early 2000s, when I was first getting into Cinema — and, er, never watching it. But I’ve been meaning to get round to it… for over 20 years. Oi. Well, here it’s in HD, vs my crummy SD DVD, so maybe I’ll finally watc— oh, who am I kidding?

Recently I’ve been training a new starter at work, and she’s only 19, which means I own DVDs that “I haven’t quite got round to watching” for longer than she’s been alive. Insane. And yet, I keep buying those shiny round discs. Not so many DVDs anymore, of course, but the Blu-rays keep pouring in. April’s haul is headlined by a few 4K debuts: from Second Sight, Peter Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock (I owned it on DVD, but at least I never bought it on BD, so that’s something of a saving); and from Arrow, David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch (first time I’ve ever bought that — hurrah!) And if that wasn’t obscure enough for you, how about a couple of Jean Rollin vampire features courtesy of Indicator, The Shiver of the Vampires and Two Orphan Vampires. Indicator have said there’s more Rollin to come, and those releases are numbered #402 and #417, so I guess by “more” they mean “at least 15”. Whew. I ought to get round to watching them, really, so I can decide if I want to buy the rest…

The 4K market is a funny place right now, with relatively obscure titles as likely to get a lavish box set as anything famous, and random shit making it to disc before highly-regarded classics — as one disc-related Twitter account observed the other day, we’re getting shit like Skyline on 4K before the likes of Aliens, The Terminator, The Abyss, A.I., Minority Report, Avatar, and The Fly. All of which is a long-winded segue into saying I do buy more “mainstream” stuff too, like Babylon, Collateral, and Saw (the Steelbook, but only because it was significantly cheaper than the regular release). Also The Trial, which is a Kafka adaptation by Orson Welles released by a major-ish studio, so kinda falls between the two stools.

Back in good ol’ 1080p land, most of my purchases seemed to come from Eureka, and in bulk: a quintet of silent works by director F.W. Murnau in the going-out-of-print Early Murnau set; a quartet of classic Universal horrors in Creeping Horror, their latest box set collecting sundries from the studio’s 1930s–’40s output; and a quartet of Westerns from the Masters of Cinema line, thanks to a random sale, the best known of which is easily Shane, but also Andre de Toth’s Day of the Outlaw, Anthony Mann’s The Man from Laramie, and John Ford’s Two Rode Together. Finally, a new release: The Bullet Train — not to be confused with the recent Brad Pitt vehicle, this is a ’70s Japanese disaster movie that inspired Speed (it’s about a train with a bomb that’ll go off if it slows down).

Finally, Arrow had a sale last month, in which I picked up a quintet of Sonny Chiba titles across two box sets — The Executioner Collection (the second one’s called Karate Inferno, which might be the greatest sequel subtitle ever) and The Street Fighter Trilogy — plus Lovecraft adaptation The Dunwich Horror. And, finally-finally, a Kickstarter reward came through: a new restoration of the 1911 adaptation of Dante’s Inferno, aka L’inferno; although apparently the “restoration” is pretty poor. Oh well.

Greyhound (2020)

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2020 #164
Aaron Schneider | 92 mins | digital (UHD) | 2.39:1 | USA, Canada & China / English | 12 / PG-13

Greyhound

In the early days of the US joining World War 2, ageing Navy Captain Ernie Krause (Tom Hanks) is finally given his first command, as captain of the lead escort for a convoy of Allied supply and troop ships crossing the Atlantic. As they enter the treacherous part of the ocean too far from land for air support, a pack of German U-boats begins stalking the convoy…

Perhaps the key word to describe Greyhound would be “efficient”. It spends about as much time setting up its premise as I did in the previous paragraph. There are no drawn-out scenes of Krause meeting with the higher-ups to be given his command; no introductions to a motley cast of crewmen before they board; no scene-setting stuff of the convoy sailing out from port… We first meet these boats in the middle of the ocean, their air support signalling “good luck” via Morse code as it turns to head home. There’s a brief flashback to the previous Christmas, when Krause informs his girlfriend (an age-appropriate Elisabeth Shue) of his new station, and then we’re off to the races: a radar contact suggests an enemy submarine, and a game of cat and mouse begins.

What follows over the next 70-or-so minutes is a lean, no-nonsense series of combat sequences. Character development is limited to expressions and glances, or incidental details. For the former, we know Krause is inexperienced, so as we watch his face we can read his silent internal battles about the best course of action; or we see that the eyes of the crew are always watching him, in shots that are held maybe just a little too long, implying the men’s uncertainty about their commander. For the latter, the ship’s cook regularly brings Krause meals that he never eats — he’s too busy being on guard to spend time on food. The rest of the crew are mostly faceless, just bodies to relay orders and information back and forth, or to man machinery. One man or another might get focus for a bit (the sonar operator is significant during the first encounter, for example), but the film doesn’t expend effort to unnecessarily bring individuals back later. Consequently, the feel is realistic: the crew hasn’t been streamlined for the sake of a movie narrative; a ship is staffed by dozens of men, sharing jobs so others can rest, the only constant being the very top men, namely Krause and his XO, played by Stephen Graham.

You sunk my battleship!

The impression of realism extends to the dialogue, the vast majority of which is naval jargon. I didn’t have a bloody clue what most of it actually meant (it’s all bearings and ranges and orders about direction and speed and whatnot), but you don’t need to because the visuals are telling the story. The film is adapted from a novel, The Good Shepherd by C.S. Forester, and if it’s at all faithful then I have no desire to read the book, because I don’t think I’d have a clue what was happening. But it works magnificently in the visual medium of film, where what the barked words signify is conveyed succinctly by the accompanying images. New sonar information leads to men with maps and rulers rushing to work out new courses; the ship turning this way and that in response to relayed commands; Krause rushing from one side to the other, binoculars always in hand, trying to spot any sign of their underwater foe amid the choppy mid-Atlantic waves. I have no idea how faithful it is to the reality of WW2 naval combat, but it feels genuine.

Some reviewers have found this unrelenting focus on the business of sea combat to be dull. I felt exactly the opposite. The threat of the U-boats is ever present, a constant danger that leaves our men pinging from one crisis to the next. The intensity is underlined by Blake Neely’s ominous, percussive score, which shrieks when the enemy is near and thuds throughout combat, in a good way. Combined with the brief running time, it feels like the film doesn’t let up. This isn’t some stately drama about men at sea who are occasionally forced to take potshots at an unseen enemy, but an action movie; only instead of men clashing with kung fu or guns, it’s boats and subs fighting with torpedoes and, um, trigonometry. The result is tight, tense, and thrilling.

4 out of 5

Greyhound is available on Apple TV+ now.