Dark Habits

They watch pictures, don't they?

2010-12-13T07:45:00.013+11:00

“All of us who professionally use the mass media are the shapers of society. we can vulgarize that society. We can brutalize it. Or we can help lift it onto a higher level.” – William Bernbach

“The public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything. Except what is worth knowing. Journalism, conscious of this, and having tradesman-like habits, supplies their demands.” – Oscar Wilde

So you want to be a film journalist? Only an insane person would answer yes to that question, which coincidently happens to be one of the most useful requisites of the job.

Having experienced the challenges of getting started (then restarted) in the field I've taken some pleasure answering advice-seeking emails over the years. That's not hand-wringing glee at pummelling another innocent soul with the reality they face. Given the general competitiveness of the business of journalism one would think the best thing you could do is dissuade any new freelancers from helping themselves to a slice of the pie. In fact, with that thought in mind I can hardly believe I’m gonna write the rest of this article…

Nevertheless, you expressed an interesting in becoming a film journalist. What comes first? Above all else a passion for film goes without say. It’s got to be even more than this though, there’s an extent to which you have to be obsessive compulsive about cinema, the culture and history, not to mention the personalities. It’s not the be all and end all, I’ve read critics along the way for whom film comes some way down the pecking order but whom can offer the most intelligent analysis of a film you’ll see anywhere. Some are just smart like that, unfortunately not I.

That isn’t the only purpose of a film journalist though, yours is to know the business and its players as thoroughly as possible. Hopefully as a consumer of a wide variety of media you will also have a strong grasp of society, culture and politics more broadly, if only so you can locate films within contexts crucial to their reading.

I’ve harked on about this previously, but it’s so important to get involved with your local community of filmmakers and give yourself a better understanding of what motivates these creatives to expose themselves to critical eyes. ‘Know your enemy’ is not really applicable because no filmmaker should be your enemy – with the exception of Lars von Trier for some, Michael Bay for others – the principle, however, is sound. A little humility goes a long way when it comes to reviewing the labours of so many; it’s a helluva lot harder to build something from nothing than to tear it down.

Assuming you have a grounding of knowledge the next thing is reading and research. Pick writers whose work challenge and entertain you, keep them in your regular cycle of weekly reads. Figure out what it is about their style and structure that works and experiment with similar variations in your own writing. Find a range of writers to follow from different publications, with different audiences because as a writer you’re going to have to adapt your style depending on who is gonna help you pay your bills (did I mention the year I was writing for a paranormal magazine?). Course, you have to find your own voice too, but be aware that no matter what it’ll have influences, better you at least know where some of them come from.

Reading a number of different websites and magazines will give you a broad knowledge of what’s happening in the world of film as a whole: from mainstream consumer magazines like Empire to industry websites such as The Hollywood Reporter and indieWIRE or blogs such as Deadline: Hollywood and /Film for news; in-depth critical analysis from journal magazine such as Sight & Sound to major broadsheets such as The Guardian and New York Times. The more you read the more equipped you’ll be to have an informed opinion.

As if that wasn’t enough homework to get you started my next suggestion is to know your local writing industry. It might be because I’m pretty anal about these things, when I first arrived in Australia I spent hours on Google navigating all the film content producer websites and blogs (I'm not going to tell who who they are, but there's a list of links to the right ----->), finding out who was who, where the talent was and, quite frankly, where the money was – because getting paid for your words is the one of the points of this exercise. Besides all that, I think it polite and professional to have an idea of your peers in the industry given that your voice isn’t geographically singular. Knowing who the other writers are will help you fill gaps in your contacts list (we’ll come to that shortly) and give you your own sense of community – it can be daunting going to those early screenings and junkets not knowing anyone. The advent of Twitter has made it a lot easier for us to communicate and meet each other in ways that might have seemed a little creepy before.

Part of the research you’ll need to do is wrapped up in the above, the rest has to do with building your contacts book from filmmakers, curators, screen organizations, publicists to editors. Hopefully by this point you should have stretched your legs with a bit of writing, a blog is a very helpful avenue to explore your style. So first up email all the editors of websites and magazines you’d like to write for explaining why and including samples (best is links) to some of your writing (short pieces only, no editor is going to read a 2,000 word essay on Bergman). Don’t forget, your email will be taken as a piece of writing so be engaging.

If you are looking at journalism as a fulltime option then work experience is definitely the way to go. Getting an insiders look will give you a big advantage when it comes to freelancing as a lots of writers who haven’t worked on a publication basically ignore a lot of the style points (filmmakers or film-makers?) which drives editors crazy when editing and formatting articles. It will also give you an appreciation for the amount of administration that goes on in putting together a publication, from purchase orders to invoices, flat-plans to forward plans, picture editing to transcription… all the really fun stuff... ahem.

Once you’ve got in with an editor and have an outlet to file your work for, next to contact are the publicists, which means figuring out all the distributors (Disney, Sony, Paramount, Madman, Hopscotch etc) and sometimes the PR firms who handle the press on their behalf. Bear in mind theatrical and home entertainment are two completely separate entities, so if you’re expecting check discs (or ‘screeners’) to start pouring through the front door that’s going to take a little more work.

As the online domain has grown exponentially it’s become a little trickier to get onto mailing lists for screenings, so when you email a publicist make sure you say who your editor is and provide them as a reference (don’t forget to let the editor know). There’s two or three tiers of screening, first is often exhibitors and marketing people. Next is ‘long-lead’ media (monthly magazines) and then finally ‘short-lead’ (online, radio, tv, weeklies etc), the latter of which comes around a week or two before the release date*. All distributors have slightly different styles and attitudes (embargoes etc), be prepared to adjust accordingly.

* Speaking of release dates, there’s heaps of info online, but the distributors also send around schedules. I try to use these to keep my own master release schedule for the coming six months so I can work on feature ideas in advance.

Back to editors for a moment, there’s a couple of things they are looking for from writers beyond being an entertaining read so keep in mind: clean copy will get you everywhere; formatted to magazine style; on time, on time, on time. Once you’ve started getting reviews in the bag and proved yourself not only as a writer but also for your reliabillty, it won’t be long before you get asked to do an interview.

You’ll be needing a microphone and some kind of recording device (or something that does both). For the past few years I’ve used my iPod with an iTalk, which is perfect for me. MP3 Dictaphones are also really good and for a while I’d use both after one heinous failure to record incident. Which bring me to another piece of advice, test your equipment before your interview and check intermittently during the interview the device is recording.

I interviewed Alejandro González Iñárritu for 21 Grams way back when, nervous fiddling caused me to pause my recorder right at the start and I didn’t check it once during. It was a 30-minute interview and as soon as I realised having got off the phone I had to write as much as I could from memory (aided by fact there were many stock answers from the director). Unsurprisingly it became more of a ‘mood piece’, which actually worked out fine for that particular film.

How do you record telephone interviews? Two ways, the first is by finding a bit of spyware which is simply a microphone that goes into your recording device then into your ear – look out for the Olympus TP-7. The second way is to use Skype and a recording program such as Audio Hijack or Pamela Call Recorder (HT @gerardelson).

These days 15-20 minutes are pretty standard interview slots, which isn’t a lot to work with so you got to be prepared. Research the hell out of your subject and be prepared with 10-12 questions – if you get a chatty subject you’ll be lucky to get in eight questions, while someone with jetlag might leave you with no questions left and five minutes to run. Be prepared to think outside the box or tear up your script. If the subject gets excited about a particular topic of conversation, stick with it. I was a door-to-door salesman one summer when I was 19 and they call it looking for the ‘Hot Spot’.

Ten minutes of interview transcription will normally run you around 1,000 words (you will certainly use only half of the material you get). Transcription, as you may come to discover, is what you will do more of than anything else as a journalist, perhaps with the exception of chasing money. I regret not keeping up with my shorthand, but our NCTJ teacher was a scary.

Which reminds me, Media Law – you do well to at least teach yourself a little about libel, slander, fair comment and do your best to afford the first two. I’m not, however, going to tell you how to write an article other than offering a couple of tips:

1) Avoid quote dumping to pad your article out, the point is to tell the story in your own words with a few quotes to qualify them or when something is particularly interesting. Anything else is laziness and if you don’t like excessive exposition in your films, imagine how readers feel about excessive quote dumping.

2) Give your editor a couple of headline ideas to use and a standfirst – they will love you for it.

3) Try keep your first par down to 80 words and drop your first quote in the second or third. It's by no means a strict formula, but it's a good start to habitualise. Struggling to lose words? Chances are the first and last pars are surplus to requirement.

4) Never, ever, write in the first person for any publication other than your own blog, unless you are Roger Ebert, then you can pretty much do whatever the hell you like.

5) Always try to sleep on any article before submitting. A bit of distance helps proof-reading immensely, otherwise you just read whatever you intended to write.

Back to interview technique, I really want to say this and can't state how important it is: do not be afraid to ask tough questions of your subjects. You're not there to fan their ego, that's what they have assistants, agents and fans for. Your job is to get the story, find something of value for your readers that 20 other daytime television faces at the junket didn't bother looking for. Be challenging and ask difficult questions, especially if the content matter of the film provokes it. If you're interviewing Cameron Diaz about her latest rom-com it's probably not necessary to resort to waterboarding in the hotel bathroom. A smart filmmaker will respect you for being engaged while the assholes will give great colour for your piece.

Point is, if you've got a burning question in mind but are scared the interview with be cut short or turn competely pear-shaped, earn trust from the subject by warming them up and build toward that tricky question. Save enough time at the end of the interview so you can follow up. Chances are if you're scared to ask something, you're probably on the right track*.

* I will not be held responsible for any loss of earnings as a result of this advice.

And I highly recommend reading as many interviews with the subject as possible to find out what makes them tick and what their default answers are. Read the production notes for the film and as soon as the subject falls into retelling quotes you've seen elsewhere, cut them off as quickly as possibly and ask a question that throws them off guard.

Feels like I've given you plenty to get started, so some final thoughts. Journalism takes perseverance, film journalism is no exception to that rule. Other useful tidbits: try and join a trade union, they will help you out when errant publishers aren't paying you; and only sell first serial rights, never sign-off on ownership to your work.

The little issues matter, you are a part of the film industry in your suburb, your city and your country. If faced with the choice between Avatar 2 opening weekend and your local single screen cinema closing down, guess which is the biggest story?

As a journalist you have influence, however small. Know that even with only a little power comes great responsibility. This post is by no means exhaustive, I'm could write a book about the magazine's I've written for, the ones that folded, the maniacal publishers, the dastardly accountants, the brilliant editors and the alcoholic writers. It's hard work, but it's damn fun too.

Good night, and good luck.

This article was written as part of the #OzFilmBlogathon.

Confessions of a film journalist: Pt 2

2010-12-06T22:29:00.036+11:00

"I am out here for you. You don't know what it's like to be me, out here for you. It is a pride-swallowing siege I will never fully tell you about." Jerry Maguire

As proud as I am of my profession, the older I have gotten the more reticent I have become about telling people. Without fail the next up question is a variation of the following: "so you get paid to watch movies?" Well, yes, but no. Not at all in fact. If I did get paid to simply watch movies I'd probably have been able to retire by this point.

The same as any type of journalist, I get paid for producing words – literally, seen as most publications pay by the word and not by the article. Sometimes those words are about a specific film (criticism), sometimes a news story (reportage), and the rest are usually interviews or profiles (features). Each article type is very particular and demands very different writing skills. A great news writer cannot necessarily turn around a great feature or review and the same is true in reverse.

I never enjoyed news writing that much and truth be told I've never been particularly good at it. I enjoy reportage, chasing a story and getting interviews, it's the formality of the write-up that gets me. My strong suit isn't really in criticism either. This is my confession, I don't particularly think I'm a very good critic. What I do think is that I can tell a story well and with a nice turn of phrase. As such, I love meeting filmmakers, actors, musicians, cultural curators, festival organisers and telling their story to the world, or at least the very small population of Planet Earth who frequent the pages of my publications.

These are still the glamour parts of the profession, and even then sometimes writing can become very unglamorous. I can't remember ever having written so much and enjoyed writing so little as I did for the most part of 2009. It was my first full year in Sydney, although I'd initially arrived in 2008 I'd also spent some six months living and working on the mountains of New Zealand and a farm in Victoria.

Returning to Sydney in January of 2009 I began setting up a film journalism career from scratch and by the time the year was out I'd written enough words that printed out in Helvetica Neue size 12 they would reach from here to the moon and back*. I'm a pretty fast writer, but at that velocity you don't get much time for proof-reading, pleasure or watching movies (although I actually watched 230).

* statistic maybe factually inaccurate.

It was a far cry from my heady heights as a commissioning editor on DVD Review. What I loved about that role was working with other writers, coming up with ideas, collaborating with the magazine designers and refining feature articles so they read the best they possibly could. Across from the DVD Review desk was the Hotdog team, where my best friend Tristan Burke was the Deputy Editor. After Hotdog folded, Tristan moved to Sydney and onto music journalism, eventually being made Editor of 3D World.

Hard as this might be for many here in Sydney to imagine, but that was one publishing company (Paragon Publishing) with two film magazines and around 10 full-time film journalists – there were at least six monthly consumer film and four DVD magazines in the market at the time (not to mention academic and B2B titles). The pay was dreadful but we didn't give a shit. All we cared about was putting out the best magazines possible and what interviews we were getting.

I fought hard to realign DVD Review a little closer to the cinephile side of our readership rather than the multiplex-in-their-living-room types that was our core readership. Two of the proudest moments in my career were the Jim Henson feature I ran, which included dynamite interviews from The Henson Company – including Steve Whitmore, discovered by Henson as a 16-year old puppeteer and who would eventually takeover as Kermit – and the black and white Martin Scorsese cover that to this day I still can't believe our Editor Paul Morgan signed off on.

Paul was very mainstream with his taste and correctly resolute in keeping the magazine in that territory, but he trusted his team and was willing to take chances if you argued a good case. To this day he is still the best editor I've ever worked with even if he flat refused my arguments for a Shawshank Redemption cover when the special edition was released (I so wanted the rain-drenched hero shot to be our cover that month).

The relationship between journalist and editor can be amazing in the right circumstances. I made a point of engaging with my writers, believing every feature article to be a collaborative effort. Like a sportsperson and their coach, it's all about helping a talented individual reach their potential – God knows I can used all the help I can get. Lately I've had more bad experiences with editors than good. Lucky for me I still know a few good ones.

Making magazines about movies was such an immense and rewarding pleasure that I can't accept the thought of the industry's demise and nor do I. My suspicion is tablet devices are the future of publishing, they may even usurp the world wide web, however I am unshakable in my belief there will always be room for great niche magazines in the same way I suspect vinyl will outlast the CD. And besides, there will always be something special about paper and ink.

* Random aside: 5 favourite interviews in my career (in no particular order and apologies it's so guy-centric):>

1. Michael Ironside
"My dad turned to me and said you had a game plan there for a while, which was I’d do a large studio picture and then go do a few small ones; one for my wallet and a couple for my heart. I gotta a funny feeling this one will satisfy both." We talked for around an hour and half, though scheduled for 30 minutes on Total Recall, only reason we stopped was he'd promised to pick up his gran kids from school.

2. Michel Gondry
"I’ve had my heart broken two or three times since. It’s hard, but sometimes it makes me happy because it helped me make this film." And hour and half late, terribly hungover after a night out in London with John Malkovich, Gondry and I lamented our failed relationships while discussing Eternal Sunshine.

3. Danny Boyle
"I think the scale of the film was too much for me, well, not too much, rather I just didn’t work at my best at that kind of scale. I’m good at inspiring people on a one to one basis, and you can’t do that when you’ve got a crew of 300 people, it’s just insane. So after I finished I went to Manchester and made a couple of really small films on mini-DV. What brought that technology onto 28 Days Later, it was like a training exercise." Very intelligent and honest, Boyle was open to any question including those on The Beach.

4. Paul VerhoevenJust cos he was so damn cool and directed some of the best science fiction films in history. This was my fanboy interview.

5. Christopher Doyle
"The resonance of cinema is the extrication of the personality of the image-maker with the person behind the camera.... The whole reason people makes films is to try and share something, to engage and celebrate some idea that is so basic and integral to who the person is that they have to make a film about it. Writing a book is a little bit easier...." Drunk as a skunk, sharp as a whip, completely brilliant.

Greatest missed opportunity? Oliver Stone, who I was due to interview for Alexander. This interview meant a lot to me, I'd written my undergrad thesis on Stone and the day before we were scheduled for a one-on-one he'd been at the film's press conference at London's Dorchester on Park Lane. I decided to pass on introducing myself, you know, because I was playing it cool. Sadly, irritated by the critical pounding his film was taking Stone jumped on a plane with Colin Farrell bound for Ireland, no doubt to get pissed on the best Guinness in the world.

Despite the above, remember the words of Bob Sugar: "It's not showfriends, it's showbusiness."

If you survive long enough you will inevitably become more familiar with some filmmakers, maybe even an actor or two (probably not, they are a different breed from most humans). Mostly though you are just a tool the studios and their publicists use to spread word about the products they wish to sell, and to be able to do your job as a journalist you need to see things from a distance as much as humanly possible. Seeking filmmaker approval by Tweeting your positive reviews @them in hope of carrying future favour is unsightly – try to avoid this.

I'm pretty hardline about such things. If you don't like seeing American 'journalists' on Fox News pander to Republican politicians, asking easy questions so they'll come back on the show, then always be aware there is supposed to be a line that divides us. This is not the barrier of celebrity and audience, which Twitter has seemingly destroyed. It is that of journalist and subject, especially if you are to be trusted as one.

"Critics are the only thing standing between consumers and advertising," says Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com.

I couldn't agree more. And when people doubt the role you play as a critic they fail to realise the extent to which every waking moment of the day they are beset on all sides by omnipresent marketing devices. How can you seek to address the balance if you're not completely 100 per cent honest with yourself, let alone your readers? See Bill Cunningham New York and you will understand.

The above may or may not apply to you, it depends on your goals are as a film journalist. I've certainly been far from perfect in my career: swanky hotels, junket gifts, promise of access, all little sub-conscious brides I've taken alone the way. That's just how the system works, doesn't it?

In the words of Lester Bangs: "You cannot make friends with the rock stars. That's what's important. If you're a rock journalist - first, you will never get paid much. But you will get free records from the record company. And they'll buy you drinks, you'll meet girls, they'll try to fly you places for free, offer you drugs... I know. It sounds great. But they are not your friends. These are people who want you to write sanctimonious stories about the genius of the rock stars, and they will ruin rock and roll and strangle everything we love about it."

So very true. But I realise I've digressed significantly.

The reason I raise these issues is Sydney seems, to me at least, to have exploded with film writers in the past two years. Given the lack of outlets and the old timers who are entrenched at the crease, as it were, it is very difficult to make a living profession out of this trade unless you are extraordinarily talented, impossibly hardworking or exceptionally lucky.

Where you see yourself in the spectrum is entirely your own business and there should be room in this country of 20 million people for a range of writers and outlets in this industry. But like Australian films, producers of film commentary are in danger of being sidelined by our cousins in the UK and the US. It makes sense given the marketing budgets of studios in those countries are significantly bigger. The internet means they will always be the first to get access, while we are lucky to get access at all.

The import of foreign magazines make it even harder for Australian publishers to compete. That some of the major publications syndicate content (probably at a higher price than paying a local writer) is just ridiculous. If Australian film is to flourish it is imperative publishers and publicists support local writers. Publishers need to recognise the importance not only of discovering the talent at their doorstep, but allowing them to fill a niche that the US and UK cannot compete by extending focus on Australian film.

In parallel, Australian film journalists must realise for the industry to grow and for opportunities in this field to expand, we must play our part in nurturing film in this country from the grassroots up. Limiting ourselves to reposting American casting news, American trailers and American film reviews we stunt the growth of the local industry and our own jobs as a result. Where the internet gives the world access to US and UK journalists with their geographical advantage, Australia will always be a poor orphan, begging for celebrity scraps and falling over ourselves when Hollywood movie stars of the latest stale rom-com, desperate for coverage, grace us with a press conference once a blue moon.

In the same vein we should not allow ourselves to be cheerleaders of mediocrity, but champions of creativity; constructively commentating on local happenings, building prestige through diligent analysis. We should challenge Australian filmmakers and industry bodies to do better and shout as loud as we can when good and great films come our way.

Proportionally I'm certain as much Hollywood junk lands on our shores as is produced here. The difference is that junk tends to make far more money. Why? Because we can't help but feed the obsession with American celebrity and those vacuous faucets already have enough column inches without our help.

Earlier on Twitter I mused what would happen if Australian journalists committed to a complete blackout on American films for a week. What if we made it a fortnight? I'm curious how publicists would react and whether release dates would adjust accordingly. What if we were more like the French? If we want our filmmakers to continue to raise their game we should do so ourselves as film journalists.

Where is Australia's Social Network I read today? Well, where is our Sight & Sound or Cahiers Du Cinema? We had Senses Of Cinema, but for reasons beyond understanding Screen Australia has chosen not to continue funding the journal.

We cannot merely compare Australian films to the best five films from America every year because with every hit come a dozen pieces of shit – though each with enough stars to warrant endless publicity. In such circumstances what chance do we give Australian films? What chance do we give ourselves?

One enduring characteristic of journalists is our love for an underdog, lost causes even more so. Australian film seemed for a long time the latter, these days it is the former. As the nouvelle vague of film journalists just finding your feet in the new media world, I can only encourage you to make your mark by forging a niché and raising the quality of dialogue and engagement with the local industry and community. We can all become big fish in a small pond if we choose, or we can remain minos in an ocean.

In the next couple of days I'll write my third instalment in this series serving up that practical advice I promised on how to get started on the path to film journalism glory and assured unending poverty.

Confessions of a film journalist: Pt 1

2010-12-06T07:26:00.024+11:00

In my first contribution to the Oz Film Blogathon I warm up by discussing how I got started in film journalism. Part two which I'll have ready tomorrow will look more specifically at the role of a film journalist...

As far back as I can remember I wanted to be a film journalist…

Not quite Henry Hill, I’ll give you that. But the sentiment remains. Growing up there were two things that dominated my world: football and movies, and I devoured both with equal relish. Football was what all the kids were into. Movies, however, well they came from my Grandpa.

The two earliest films I remember seeing at the cinema were E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial around 1983 with my mum and Basil The Great Mouse Detective with my Grandpa around 1986. The memory that holds the most water though is of the Global Video shop my Grandpa took me to whenever I stayed with him and my Gran, which was frequently.

Duncan McKinnon was a tech savvy guy and a diligent video pirate. Anything we rented deemed of decent quality and of high rewatchability was 'doubled' using the two VHS recorders he owned (one of which used old cartridge loading dock on top of casing). Furthermore, he numbered all the tapes and maintained a record in a little notepad of the two or three films recorded on each video (depending on whether they’ve been dubbed using Slow Play or Long Play). Of course he was also taping lots of films off the telly and pausing during the commercial breaks – there were always a few films where he’d forget pause was on and the film would continue five minutes after the break had ended. He would have loved PVRs.

The other thing my Grandpa did was buy cases for all his dubbed films, the kind of cases that looked like hardback covers of anthology books from a stately library. Those cases were bigger than regular packaging, about the size of the rental cases.

The Global Video shop in East Kilbride’s village was the greatest place on Earth as far as I was concerned. Filled with posters of the most amazing American movies I was no-where near old enough to watch. Gremlins was an early favourite of mine along with, I’m not ashamed to admit, the Police Academy series. My Grandpa though also instilled a taste for older cinematic offerings in me. As a singer he was a big fan of Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, as such films like Top Hat, Swing Time and, of course, Singin’ In The Rain have always been a part of my film vernacular.

His other favourite was the Westerns, which seemed to be uniformly on daytime television at the weekends in the 80s, perhaps because of the rampant popularity of Reagan-era Americas at the time – he had, after all, been a star of the Westerns. It comes as no surprise, looking back, that stories of ‘Cowboys and Indians’ were my first great cinematic love and probably played a large part in my decision to study American Studies at university.

It’s impossible, however, to quantify how much of an influence my Grandpa had on my career as a result of those first 11 years of my life, for which he was the biggest part. My mother was a single mom those first three years and I’m told I called my Grandpa ‘dad’. Duncan McKinnon passed away on 14 December 1989, but his presence is still very much felt by my book shelf, my DVD collection, the words you’re reading right now and the boxes of dubbed videotapes in my parents' attic.

After my Grandpa passed my Gran picked up the slack, lying about my age to get me into all the films I wanted to see at the cinema but wasn’t old enough. There was JFK at age 12, rated 15 by the BBFC – I honestly had never heard the word ‘fuck’ so many times in my life. My Gran slept through a good portion of the film. I think she’s wishes she’d slept through Event Horizon, during which I was more scared of her having a heart attack than I was by the film (which was terrifying) itself.

People often ask what American Studies, was all about. I always thought the answer to that question pretty obvious, what I will say is I did a lot of film studies as part of the course. How could one even pretend to have an understanding of American culture without understanding film, its history and its mechanisms?

In 1999-2000 I lived and studied at Utah State University as part of my exchange year where Prof Jay Anderson's film classes were a highlight. When I returned for my fourth and final year at University Of Leicester I took the opportunity to write film reviews for The Ripple, our student newspaper (the film editor, Nikki Baughan, went on to become the editor of Film Review). My first published criticism, if you could call it that, was for a reparatory screening of Natural Born Killers and boy was it horrible. Reading it back today at least offers encouragement that time has afforded me some improvement. Excessive plot description, and a fusion of standard critic clichés and academia speak are what’s most notable about the review – some might argue little has changed.

There were other opportunities, Legend Of Bagger Vance was my first 10am screening inside an almost empty Odeon Cinema, and although I had never heard the phrase ‘magic negro’ before, I certainly recognised his presence. Pay It Forward and Gone In 60 Seconds were the other gems I was unleashed upon in my spell for The Ripple. If I wanted to be cynical I would suggest those four films represented a microcosm of nearly every year in my cinematic life since. The truth is, every year since I’ve experienced moments of transcendence in the movie theatre.

* 5 randomly selected moments of cinematic transcendence in my life:

1. The Ecstasy Of Gold, The Good, The Bad And The Ugly (Sergio Leone)

2. Prejudice, 12 Angry Men (Sidney Lumet)
3. Interrogation, Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock)
4. Welcome wagon, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind (Steven Spielberg)
5. Four million-year match-cut, 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick)

* 5 randomly selected moments of cinematic transcendence in the past 10 years:

1. Train to Zaniba’s cottage, Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki)
2. Corridor fight, Oldboy (Park-Chan Wook)
3. Ratatouille, Ratatouille (Brad Bird)
4. Chicken run, City Of God (Fernando Mirielles)

5. Ceasefire, Children Of Men (Alfonso Cuaron)

Leaving university I knew had to be a journalist, and more specifically I wanted to write about film. I really had no idea how to get started or what to do, and after my first failed attempted to live in London I ended up back in Leeds. There I wrote a couple of reviews for excellent local magazine The Leeds Guide while Laurence Boyce was Film Editor, mostly I temped at a variety of banks and published poetry on websites that shall go unnamed. It was a difficult beginning during which I nearly lost hope of becoming a writer, let alone a film journalist.

One year after graduating university I signed up to study an NCTJ post-grad in magazine journalism at a college in Brighton. It was the best decision of my life if for no other reason than it awakened a journalistic instinct for storytelling and gave me confidence to approach publications for work. Soon after I was putting together a section focussing on the local digital filmmaking scene in street press mag The Insight. I was launch editor for the new section and was very proud to compile stories each month for my little page in the magazine.

One of the first interviews I ever did was with a filmaker called Simon Wilkinson who ran an independent production company called Junk TV along with Paul Dutnall. It was a formative interview for me, opening up the world of short filmmakers, their dedication to the form and their communal nature. Junk TV not only made short films, but they organised screenings and worked as educators encouraging and training at-risk youth to make films. I've never been far from like-minded people since and it's my firm believe that any film journalist worth their salt should engage with their local community of short filmmakers.

At the same time, along with my friend Jonathan Crocker, I tracked down publicists for all the major studios and got onto their regional media screening lists. I started getting invited to previews at private cinemas in London such as Mr Young’s (later known as Soho Screening Rooms), and to press conferences (the earliest I can remember were 25th Hour, City Of God, Solaris, Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind and The Quiet American). Jon went on to become Contributing Editor of Total Film, Associate Editor of Little White Lies and Film Editor for ID, among other prestigious titles.

As any film writer will tell you, it's quite a moment going to your first movie in a private screening room early in the morning. Coffee and biscuits usually awaited your arrival at Mr Young's, along with the film's press notes and a friendly publicist to welcome you.

At the time I was more excited about the venerable critics in my midst than the celebrity press conferences. To see films with the likes of Peter Bradshaw, Kim Newman, Mark Kermode or whoever was something of a privilege and also an affirmation of my career aspirations.

My journey though would next take me to Bournemouth. After a stint of work experience on late, great cult film magazine Hotdog, I was offered a job on Essential Home Cinema (I actually wrote one of the first consumer articles in the UK about HD) and less than a year later I was the Features Editor for DVD Review, the best home entertainment magazine in the UK and third highest-selling film magazine behind Empire and Total Film. I couldn’t believe I’d finally scored my dream job of being paid to write about movies as a full time job.

Okay, I suspect this article is starting to get a little bit boring now. There’s a lot I want to share about my experiences as a film journalist and how I came to be plying my trade in Sydney, but I think it’s nice to leave some things to mystery. Needless to say in the last eight years I’ve seen many magazines come and go, written a few hundred film reviews, conducted a few hundred interviews with filmmakers, actors and musicians. But the best part has been the dozens of wonderful film journalists just mad passionate about their work, despite its economic challenges.

When I return for part two of this article I'd like to give more insight and guidance in how to get started, advice on good journalistic practice, the challenges we face as film writers and some perspectives on the differences between the trade in Sydney and London.

I'm building towards some things I want to get off my chest about the importance of local content production. We often talk about Australian film, the quality of, and audience's disposition to see those local productions. Similar quandries apply to content producers of film criticism, and although Australia is only my adopted home I believe passionately in the need to have a strong, independent local film press, supported by distributors. More than this, I believe we have a role to play in the development of quality local cinema, from the grassroots of digital shorts to the big league production companies.

Oz Film Blogathon

2010-12-06T07:15:00.016+11:00

The Oz Film Blogathon begins today. If you have anything you'd like to submit as part of the film writing marathon post the link in the comments sections and I'll collate the pieces all together on this page.

Remember, the thematic framework proposed is: 'The Things We Think But Do Not Say'.

All you need to do is write something about the local industry and post it on your blog, submit the links to me (scott.journalist[at]gmail.com) or post them in the comments of this blog. I will aggregate all the articles here. Aim high and be as fearless as you can muster. Articles on local and national industry issues are of highest value.

• Write (or record) something about Australian film industry that's been on your mind.
• Contribute links to old articles that might be a little 'touchy feely'
• Participate by commenting or generally spreading the word.

Articles will all be linked in this post and I will create a button for the home page too.

Happy writing!

Oz Blogathon Announcement (3/11/10)
Oz Blogathon Update (19/11/10)

'Confessions Of A Film Journalist: Pt 1' Scott Henderson (6/12/10)

'Confessions Of A Film Journalist: Pt 2' Scott Henderson (7/12/10)

'They Watch Pictures Don't They' – I offer some guidance on getting started as a film journalist... for whatever that advice is worth. (13/12/10)

'Critical Thoughts' – Thomas Caldwell considers what makes good film criticism (12/12/10)

'What's Become Of The Brisbane Cinema Scene' – Sarah Ward profiles what's happening with cinema in Brisvegas (12/12/10)

'A Very Brief Personal Journey Through Australian Film' – "The tide is turning, it is turning slowly but surely." Richard Haridy, Rich On Film (11/12/10)

'Oz Film Blogathon: So Very Tired' – "it's mighty easy to sit back in your comfy cinema seat and question why the average Australian doesn't pay to see a film you've just watched for free." Jess Lomas, A New Level of Nerdiness (10/12/10)

'Mind The Gap' – "At a time when information is globally available, when it comes to film why should we be forced to wait? At a time when information is globally available, when it comes to film why should we be forced to wait?" Sarah Ward, The Reel Bits (9/12/10)

'Aussie Film: catalyst required, enquire within' – there is no shortage whatsoever of concepts, nor people ready and able to bring those concepts to life. Dan Binns, Binnsy Hovel (9/12/10)

'Still Some Of The Finest Films' – "that Australia only produces depressing films is unfounded and unfairly puts people off seeing films that deserve to be seen." Thomas Caldwell, Cinema Autopsy (9/12/10) (See article below)

'High infidelity: Have we cast Australian films into the arms of another?' – Quickflix Blog Editor Simon Miraudo wonders if we've foresaken first dibs on great new Australian films (8/12/10)

'What Are We Really Watching' – Richard Gray, editor of DVDBits and The Reel Bits, questions the correlation between piracy, box office and Australian film (7/12/10)

'The Real Ugly Truth' – A blistering editorial from Encore Magazine Editor Miguel Gonzalez who says the Australian mainstream media are not paying enough attention to local productions (7/12/10)

'The Ugly Truth' – Sarrah Le Marquand offers her take on Australian film industry in The Daily Telegraphy (though one wonders if she has seen half the films released the past two years)

Some older articles submitted to #OzFilmBlogathon:

'Some Of The Finest Films' – Thomas' orginal article from June 2010

'Government As Movie Mogul' – "the nature of Australian films is significantly determined by how they are financed," Sandy George writes at Australia Screen (13/04/10)

'Festival funded films – will it change anything?' – Sandy George looks at MIFF and AFF putting their money where their audience is (10/08/09)

'Script Alive' – Live reading of in development scripts? That sounds like a pretty innovative idea. Tara Judah, Quickflix Blog (1/12/10)

'Massage The Message' – Lynden Barber says we need to figure out how to out how to better sell Australian films to Australian audiences (New Matilda, 31/10/09)
'This Mission Is Too Important For Me To Allow You To Jeopardise It' - More Australian sci-fi, cries Lyden Barber! I'm not sure he was talking about Tomorrow When The War Began, but I know what he means (New Matilda, 23/10/09)
'Please, No More Ocker Comedy Flops' – when SPAA President Anthony Ginnane suggested Australian film producers should be shot it caught Lyden Barber's attention. Fortunately he hasn't reached for his gun yet (4/12/09)
'Is Dark The New Quirky' – one year on and the conversation hasn't changed much (LB, New Matilda, 25/09/09)

Oz Film Blog-A-Thon Update

2010-11-19T12:21:00.023+11:00

A quite remarkable call to arms just hit the internet curtesy of an Australian film icon, one Margaret Pomeranz. The fairer half of ABC's At The Movies gave a powerful keynote speech to the Screen Producers Association Of Australia (SPAA) conference currently taking place in Sydney demanding support from both the Australia Government and cinema-going public for local talent. I can think of no better rallying cry for the Oz Film Blog-A-Thon, The Things We Think But Do Not Say, initiated on this blog a couple of weeks ago.

Unfortunately, life has rather a way of happening and delaying personal projects when they are dependent on spare time, something I've not had a lot of just lately. The juggling act of job hunting, freelancing and report writing for Play Now Act Now (the festival project I completed a couple of weeks back) proved a little overwhelming. The good news is I scored a job and finished my report.

Fear not, I want reassure you that the Blogathon will go ahead as planned, I simply want to push back the start date by one week to 6 DECEMBER in order give myself time to promote and write for this project.

Part of this reassurance comes in the form of a preview of a few articles I'm committing myself to writing over the next couple of weeks and some ideas I'd like share. Also I'd like to remind you of the purpose of this blogathon and how you can participate.

What's it all about?

Spurred on by the AFCA 2010 Film Writing Awards the Oz Film Blog-A-Thon is intended as an opportunity for all Australian film writers to make a insightful and constructive contribution to our industry beyond reviews of local films.

All you need to do is write something about the local industry and post it on your blog, submit the links to me (scott.journalist@gmail.com) or post them in the comments of this blog. I will aggregate all the articles here. Aim high, genuine pieces of journalism is what we're looking for. Articles on local and national industry issues are of highest value.

• Write (or record) something about Australian film industry that's been on your mind. Most of all be fearless with you opinion
• Contribute links to old articles that might be a little 'touchy feely'
• Participate by commenting or generally spreading the word

Here's four articles I aim to contribute to the marathon:

1) 'What's Up Sydney' – One of my biggest frustrations living in Sydney is the lack of choice and the limited range of programming by local exhibitors. As such I'm going to put together a compendium of what's on in Sydney and draw a side-by-side comparison with similar international cities. I'll offer my observations on what's missing and suggestions for what could make it better.

2) '15-Minute Friends' – A article taking a closer look at the publicity machine, how interviews are allocated and the journalistic limitations of the junket system. I'd also like to take a look at he embargo system and try to figure out how publicists and local content producers can better work together.

3) 'Reflections Of A Film Journalist' – Hard to believe, but it's over 10 years since I had my first article on film published. I'd like to reflect on this experience and offer some guidance for those new to the business: how to get started, good journalism practices, the pitfalls and the pleasures. I might also humbly offer some suggestions for the future of our practice.

4) 'Top 10 Game Changers' – Who are the 10 most inspirational figures in the local industry? This is a call to all those participating to help come up with a list of Australian film pioneers whose innovation and vision will propel us into the future. Submit to me your top 10 (or whatever you can muster) figures/organisations from the Australian film scene including: exhibitors, curators, journalists, producers, funders, festivals. NO film directors.

For this last article I'd like to compile an ultimate list of 10 Oz Film Inspirators (think of the Guardian recent and rather silly power list), with a view to interviewing these people about their perspectives on the future of the local film industry.

So that's it, slightly new date, same aspirations. Can't wait to get started.

UPDATE: here's what I'm getting at...

Oz Film Blog-A-Thon Announcement

2010-11-03T12:39:00.015+11:00

The Things We Think And Do Not Say

It looks like I just jumped up on my soapbox and started shouting on Twitter: "let film journalism be done, though the heavens fall." Well, if it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck, a duck it must be. Just not a lame duck, that wouldn't be much use at all (see Democrat's White House as of tomorrow).

News just broke that the Australian Film Critics Association is seeking submissions for its 2010 Film Writing Awards, which is all fine and good, but wouldn't it be even better if we looked upon the 31 December deadline as an opportunity to light a fire under journalism and criticism in the Australian film industry? When I say on Twitter we don't have that much to be proud of, I didn't mean we don't have many writer's to be proud of, we do. From Luke Buckmaster's Cinetology to Tara Judah's Liminal Vision, Thomas Caldwell's Cinema Autopsy to Matt Ravier's A Life In Film – all homes to damn fine writing and, of course, not alone.

But let's face it, a lot of our actual debate takes place on Twitter, outside of which the most provocative discussion of late was Lyden Barber's rally against games as art (I'm sure he hates me bringing it up again, but it's certainly a conversational highlight of the year). As we all know 140 characters is hardly conducive to thorough conversation and the number of those exchanges cut short by the protagonists admitting 'too complicated for Twitter' is impossible to count.

So what am I proposing? Well, with a 31 December deadline plenty of time away, I suggest an Australian Film Commentary blog-a-thon. If you've never heard the term 'Blogathon' before Filmsquish offers an nice explanation here (also lists a number of past blogathons), but basically it is a marathon or a festival of writing on a particular subject, with all the works submitted and compiled on a host blog.

It is my contention that we Australian film writers, whilst creating many insightful reviews and providing spirited Twitter commentary have failed to raise our game to coincide with the increased quality local filmmakers have served up. We have failed to challenge distributors and exhibitors with provocative analysis of decisions that affect our community. Whilst busy serving up a great volume of movie reviews and regurgitated news from American productions, we've failed to engage with local issues.

Let's take the opportunity to write something about the local industry that contributes something genuinely constructive and insightful to our cinematic landscape. If you could change one thing about the Australian film industry in 2011, what would it be and why? Saw an Aussie film in 2010 that inspired you? Saw an Aussie film with controversial themes that were brushed over? Local picture house closing down? Failure of distributors to support local content producers against tidal wave of American websites? Embargoes drive you mental when US reviews already live? Making friends with directors on Twitter – what are the boundaries of film journalism? Scared to ask tough interview questions in case you don't get asked back? Sick of same five films playing at all your local cinemas every weekend?

And it doesn't have to just be gripes, what locally has inspired you but never gets press? How about the fact local magazines and websites favour American films first, Australian films second and local film culture somewhere around council meetings. Perhaps you want to create a compendium guide to alternative Australia film events. When was the last time YOU wrote about Australian short film? Maybe you want to write about the diversity of the Australian screen in 2010 and the lack there of come Awards time.

This is your chance to write those Things We Think And Do Not Say, this is the Oz Film Blog-A-Thon. I will post an article here myself 29 November, one I've been mulling over a while, and I'd ask anyone who cares to join me to aim for then too. I'll also aim to serve up a couple more pieces over the course of the week.

If you'd like to take part, all you need to do is email your links to scott.journalist@gmail.com or post them in the comments of this post and I'll update the site. Participation can take the form of ALL MEDIA (video, audio, written word). You can even send the links for old work and we'll repost the link. If you don't have somewhere to post your writing, email it to me and I'll host it here.

Most of all, be fearless.

Oz Film Blog-A-Thon
Start: 29 November – NOW 6 DECEMBER
End: 5 December – NOW 13 DEMCEMBER

To ape Culture Snob's contribution criteria:

• Write (or record) something about Australian film industry that's been on your mind
• Contribute links to old articles that might be a little 'touchy feely'
• Participate by commenting or generally spreading the word

With that, I hope you all take this in the spirit it's proposed. I value the film community I like to think I'm a part of here in Australia and I'd love for us to come together and create a debate and provoke change worth talking about.

Recommended reading
White Elephant Blog-a-thon
The Misunderstood Blog-a-thon
Short Film Blog-a-thon
Jim Emerson's Contrarianism Blog-a-thon

Good night and good luck

2010-06-23T14:12:00.014+10:00

The news we feared is upon us. It's been confirmed by Benjamin Zeccola, executive director of Palace Cinemas, that last ditch attempts to save Academy Twin Cinema have failed.

After days of speculation, reports and an online campaign by Sydney cinephiles, the news Academy Twin will indeed close its doors for the last time 27 June, 2010 is of terrible of disappointment to a city which has already seen so many closure inflicted on its celluloid landscape. I don't have much time to ruminate on what this means to film-going culture locally in any depth right now, but bellow is a transcript of the conversation I just had with Mr Zeccola...

DH: I understand the verdict has arrived?

BZ: [The Greek Orthodox Community] has come back to us, finally, asking for an astronomical rent, marginally less than they’d originally asked for, but still an astronomical level that just cannot be sustained by any stretch of the imagination.

Does this mean the end for Academy Twin?

Yeah. We thought with all this pressure that was being brought on them by the community and probably, I would have thought, by their own constituents that they would opt for a very solid rental offer and income versus no income at all. But it looks like they’ve gone for the latter. It’s over.

Do you know if they’ve talked to any other chains formally?

I think they’ve tried but I don’t think there’s anyone interested. [editor's note: confirmed as of yesterday morning Dendy Cinemas had not had any talks with the GOC regarding Academy Twin's lease and it is highly unlikely it will be taking over the venue any time soon]

It’s hard to imagine other chains such as Events, Hoyts or Reading going into without the possibility of a significant margin…

No. Those companies in particular wouldn’t run a site in [Academy Twin’s] condition. Maybe the nightclub downstairs will extend, but who knows, it could be any number of uses. I suppose it’s not for me to speculate, but it’s not going to be a Palace Cinema and I think it’s highly unlikely it’ll be a cinema at all.

In terms of Palace Cinema in Sydney this means you’ll be focusing now on Verona and Chauvel for the future?

The Chauvel is a historic cinema in its own right, so we’ve got a focus there.

Interview ends.

That's it folks, sorry to be the harbinger of bad news. You can say your own goodbyes on the Palace Cinema website and spare a thought also the the 15 staff members who now find themselves looking for work. If you have any stories you'd like to share of experiences you've had visiting Academy Twin down the years please feel free to share in the comments section below.

I'm going to be writing an article soon on the history of Academy Twin so would love to hear from anyone who was there when the cinema reopened in 1974.

All that's left is to encourage you all to make sure the cinema's last four days are sellouts. Shouldn't be hard given the current selection which includes Animal Kingdom, Mademoiselle Chambon and Academy Award winner The Secret In Their Eyes.

To read my original article which includes comments from GOC President Harry Denalis click here.

Palace Academy Twin Cinema To Close?

2010-06-18T13:37:00.033+10:00

Palace Cinemas has announced Paddington’s Academy Twin Cinema is to close its doors indefinitely at the end of the month, one year short of its centenary. It is savage blow to film culture in a city that has already endured so much hurt by the closure of arthouse cinemas.

Commentators were quick to point at a presumed lowed audience attendance, but according to executive director Benjamin Zeccola the reason for the closure is the failure of lease negotiations between Palace and the building’s owners, the Greek Orthodox Community of NSW.

“Without exaggeration, we’ve been putting proposals to them for nigh on five years,” says Zeccola. “There maybe six months or a year between proposals but you spend a lot of time creating the plan, strategy and how you are going to execute it... It’s all been rejected."

According to Zeccola, Palace continued to make attempts to secure the lease until 5pm, Wednesday, 16 June, but fear the doors will be locked come 30 June demand the arthouse cinema chain take action to secure and remove the equipment owned and installed by the company including seats, projection units, screens and the soundsystem. “It just too late and I can’t believe we took it up to less than two weeks from when the doors will be effectively locked.”

The major impasse is the current rental rates demanded by Academy Twin owners the Greek Orthodox Community of NSW and Zeccola says the committee that manage the property has been unwilling to negotiate on this. “They will not discuss the rental level. They want a rental that is inflated, that’s above cinemas that are double the size of it. It is a ridiculous and unreasonable rental level and the condition of the building is appalling. It is just disgraceful.

“A camel is a horse designed by committee, sometimes you can’t get effective decision making through that sort of structure. It’s certainly not like dealing with an individual that has a goal. If you are dealing with one businessman who owns it or a company or any individual who wants to see the best for the property, or the property prosper into the future, that is a much more straight-forward negotiation.”

Harry Denalis, President of the Greek Orthodox Community committee that manage the property, says negotiations have not yet failed and it is Palace Cinemas making unreasonable demands with respect to the lease agreement between the two.

“We’re still talking with Palace and there will be a decision made next week. The difficulty is Palace want a drastic reduction in rent from the amount they are paying, well over a third reduction in rent to the rent they’ve been paying for the last four or five years. That’s the sticking point...

“Of course we’ve got other cinema chains that are interested and we are talking with them; as soon as the situation becomes clear with Palace we will start negotiating. We’ve already had preliminary talks and as soon as the situation with Palace becomes clear we start talking with the others with a view to retaining the cinemas as they are. Palace is not the only player in town.”

The back and forth between Denalis and Zeccola doesn’t bode well for the future of Academy Twin, which plays host to film festivals including the French, Italian, Spanish, German and Mardi Gras. What is especially disappointing about the situation is the fact audience attendance is not the ultimate threat to its immediate future, though certainly that plays a big part of what Palace can afford to invest in the venue, Sydney’s first twin cinema.

“The Academy has been effected by the openings of Bondi Junction [Events, Westfield] and Fox Studios,” admits Zeccola. “That has had an effect on the three cinemas on Oxford Street and that happens as a city grows, new competition comes in and that impacts the incumbents. That’s ok, but each individual business needs to maintain its competitive strengths and advantages and to adapt to the environment around it. Palace Cinemas is capable of adapting and we flourish under pressure.”

In this regard Palace Cinemas will certainly find a lot of support given its commitment to the arthouse industry and its role in saving the Chauvel Cinema, which it operates alongside the Verona and Academy Twin all on Oxford Street, Paddington. Zeccola argues Palace successfully show it is possible to operate all three cinemas in such close proximity by offering complementary programming and a diversity of choice for Sydney’s cinema-going community.

“That’s not actually the problem here,” continues Zeccola. “The problem here is it’s a dilapidated building and the landlord is demanding an exorbitant rent and it cannot be met. [The Greek Orthodox Community] have been taken through the figures over many years and they understand the Academy has actually been losing money substantially for a number of years and Palace cannot afford to pay them a ridiculous rent and lose money in the process.

“Palace’s responsibility is to its staff, its suppliers and the stakeholders in the business. It would be irresponsible of us to sign onto a bad rent deal. We can’t do that. The rental proposals we’ve put forward are based on a small loss and at best a break even position. There wasn’t even going to be any profit in it for this company and it was still met with the rejection of the Greek Orthodox Community.”

Despite Zeccola’s claims, Denalis is adamant the committee wants Palace to stay and it has told them as much, but that the rent demands are what they are for good reason. “Palace is not the only one that has to make money in this world. We run child care centres, hostels, churches, schools and they are just as important activities for us to continue with as it is for people to go see Hollywood flicks or whatever flicks that are showing.”

When asked whether he thought Academy Twin would suffer the same fate as Glebe’s Valhalla Twin Cinemas, Zeccola offered a bleak assessment.

“That’s what is looking likely. As it stands we don’t have a lease in a fortnight’s time. I don’t even know if in good conscious I can accept the support of people to pay an unrealistic rent from the landlord for no good reason for a dilapidated building. In order for it to be saved we need to come to terms with the landlord on a complete redevelopment.”

For his part Denalis understands Palace wishes to refurbish the cinema, but that the Greek Orthodox Community is unwilling to bear some of the cost by reducing the rent, saying “They are looking for us to invest this money in their cinemas.”

The truth, as always, may lie somewhere in the middle. What is without a doubt is that without some compromise being met between Palace Cinemas and the Greek Orthodox Community the doors to Academy Twin will close 27 June, 2010. Whether they will ever reopen once that happens should be of gravest concern to Sydneysiders as a whole and not just its cinema-loving community.

Follow Scott Henderson on Twitter for continuing updates.
Academy Twin's Facebook page to show your support.
Finally, please continuing tweet with #saveacademytwin.

Recommended reading:
Friday 18/06
Palace Cinemas announcement.
Sydney Morning Herald story.
Lyden Barber's post at Eyes Wide Open.
History of Academy Twin here and here.
DVD Bits coverage.
Boudist article by Time Out Sydney photographer Daniel Bould.
Jack Sargeant's 2005 article in Reel Time on saving Sydney's arthouse cinemas.
Chris Stephenson at MEDIAtion wonders if there's brands out there who might invest in such a media space.

Show May Not Be Over At Academy Twin – SMH Sat 20/6

Recommended viewing:
Into The Shadows trailer

The best of the best with honours 2009

2009-12-30T09:34:00.006+11:00

I was recently asked to participate in the inaugural Sydney Film Critics Best Of 2009 (cick to read SFC's top 20) poll organised by Matt Ravier of Last Night With Riviera. The following is my humble submission as to the movies that made my 2009 an unforgettable year in cinema...

How exactly do you measure the quality of a year in cinema? Top 10 lists sure are one way; for film journalists they are bread and butter as well as the staple we love to hate. There might be some truth, however, to the idea that a better measurement of the quality of a year in cinema is the films that didn’t make the cut, the ones painfully disregarded in the formation of one’s own subjective best of the best of the best. With honours.

Much maligned though it was Watchmen just barely failed to make my final list – years later it will be considered one of the great American literary adaptations. Or how about Rachel Getting Married? As genuine a portrait of a loving, dysfunctional family I’ve seen in several years. These movies made me laugh uncontrollably, cry inconsolably, boil with rage or otherwise reached into my soul, with their truth, importance or spectacle in ways that reminded me exactly why I love cinema as I do: Three Blind Mice, Avatar, The Girlfriend Experience, District 9, Public Enemies, (500) Days Of Summer, UP, Drag Me To Hell, Inglorious Basterds, Balibo, A Serious Man, The Cove.

Any one could have made my top 10, which is as reliable as a dead narrator.

TOP 10 FILM RELEASED IN AUSTRALIA, 2009

10. Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman, USA)
9. Antichrist (Lars von Trier, Denmark)
8. Moon (Duncan Jones, UK)
7. Samson & Delilah (Warwick Thornton, Australia)
6. Che (Steven Soderbergh, USA/France/Spain)
5. Let The Right One In (Tomas Alfredson, Sweden)
4. Encounters At The End Of The World (Werner Herzog, USA)
3. Where The Wild Things Are (Spike Jonze, USA)
Probably the most satisfying slow-burner of the year. Solemn and melancholic for sure, but deeply emotional and personal also. Only one film made me cry harder and longer in 2009...
2. Milk (Gus van Sant, USA)
Van Sant didn't set out to reinvent the biopic here, only to tell the story of one man and his fight for quality. Inspirational might be a cliche term for such a film, but I dream of a world where 'leaders' in Copenhagen, Washington and Canberra had even a drop of Harvey Milk's dedication to social justice.
1. Gomorrah (Matteo Garrone, Italy)
An astonishing film that literally pulverised me into desperate submission with a relentless exposé of the violent, corrupt and bleak world that consumes a small Italian community in Naples, framing its inhabitant's very existence from which there is no escape. Never has the mob underworld be so unromantised, so grimy or so deadly.

TOP 10 UNRELEASED IN AUSTRALIA, 2009

10. Beaches Of Agnes (Agnes Varda, France)
9. 35 Shots Of Rum (Claire Denis, France/Germany)
8. Up In The Air (Jason Reitman, USA)
7. In The Loop (Armando Lannucci, UK)
6. Sin Nombre (Cary Fukunaga, USA)
5. Humpday (Lynn Shelton, USA)
4. The Road (John Hillcoat, USA)
3. Goodbye Solo (Ramin Bahrani, USA)
2. Fantastic Mr Fox (Wes Anderson, USA)
1. The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigalow, USA)

NB: Anders Østergaard brilliant documentary Burma VJ was supposed to be on my final unreleased in Australia list but I somehow left it off (infuriatingly).

Film review: Where The Wild Things Are

2009-12-30T09:29:00.005+11:00

Director: Spike Jonze
Cast: Max Records, James Gandolfini
Country: USA

I don't want you to go, I'll eat you up, I love you so – KW

If Spike Jonze’s adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s classic story Where The Wild Things Are is the year’s most anticipated film, it might also the year's most flawed work of art. On the surface it is a simple story about childhood angst and flight into fantasy, but beneath that rough irreverent topsoil lies something so deeply personal and individual no one person’s experience can easily be compared to another.

Feral child Max (newcomer Max Records) is a force of nature who literally consumes the screen; chaotic energy in wolve’s clothing, wrestling a canine companion. Jonze whisks the audience back to its childhood as Max builds an igloo, preparing snowballs for an assault on his big sister’s friends, a plan that that does not quite go accordingly. Igloo in ruins, the young lad is left to nurse a damaged ego, with only his imagination to provide comfort.

Herein lie the most prominent themes of Where The Wild Things Are: loneliness and fantasy. Max’s reality is one defined in by an absent father, a distracted mother and a sister who doesn’t seem to care. That we see so little of the later two and none of the former is crucial when Max takes flight into the unknown night, before discovering a sailboat and crossing an ocean to an island inhabited by giant furry beasties. Through a mixture of brash courage and childish naivety the monsters declare Max their king, thanks to the attention of Carol, a much-desired patriarch (voiced by James Gandolfini) who simultaneously embodies the film’s overlying sense of melancholy.

Taking a book which contains only nine sentences and turning it into an $80 million feature film is no mean feat and writer Dave Eggers retains the original’s erudite approach to dialogue. As a result the slow-paced second act struggles to find meaningful narrative for its protagonists while the film’s Wild Things never really seem that threatening, beautiful though they are realised. Despite the technical expertise at work, Jonze somehow fails to find penetrate the greater depths of his ambitions.

Yet as WTWTA speeds to its conclusion, whatever angst we've suppressed in our sub-conscious, whether our relationship with our parents or our own adulthood, is suddenly and unceremoniously exposed. It is not so much a nostalgic yearning for childhood that is evoked as a need, the burning desire to belong. Family matters; and while we might wish to escape from those closest to us, Jonze reminds us that saying goodbye can be the hardest thing of all.

Film review: Antichrist

2009-12-30T09:24:00.002+11:00

Director: Lars von Trier
Cast: Willem Dafoe, Charlotte Gainsbourg
Country: Denmark

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark and, by all accounts, it is the mind of master provocateur Lars von Trier. When the filmmaker’s latest work debuted at the Cannes it was immediately guaranteed a place in the annals of the film festival’s history; booed and hissed throughout, Antichrist provoked numerous walkouts and sent a few more sensitive patrons into bouts of fainting spells thanks to scenes described by more than a few commentators as ‘needlessly graphic’.

That after all these years von Trier is still able to shock so effectively is impressive, that he is able to do so at a time when torture porn has reached the mainstream is surprising. For all the controversy and criticism dividing audiences down the middle, Antichrist remains a bizarrely beautiful film to watch. Hideous too, but there can be no denying that with the structural rigours of Dogme filmmaking set aside, von Trier remains a director of considerable artistry.

The film opens to a monochrome prologue in which Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg (neither’s characters are given names, known only as He and She) make love (though thanks to the jarring insertion of a penetration shot there’s a implied sense of pure carnal fucking) in the shower as water droplets cascade in slo-mo over their bodies. Their lust (or is it self-absorption?) is inter-cut with the misadventures of the couple’s child who, escaping from his cot, climbs onto the window ledge as snow falls outside. As She and Him climax in erotic bliss and the child falls to the accompaniment of a Handel aria, it is difficult not to be intoxicated by the devilishly interplay of beauty and tragedy. It is also the first level of disturbing material von Trier toys with as the film ups the ante in each of the proceeding chapters entitled: Grief, Pain and Despair.

After a month in hospital, Dafoe’s professional therapist decides he knows best and takes his wife home to continue her recovery, after all, “no therapist can know as much about you as I do.” Fair comment maybe, but there’s little room for doubt where his arrogance is concerned as therapy becomes a synonym for control, allowing for an argument of sly feminism in von Trier’s babbling essay. To a remote cabin the woods they head to allow Her to confront her fears. It is here curiosity about the occult, nature as Satan’s church, talking foxes and infamous genital mutilation all occur.

Amid the controversy much fun has been made of von Trier’s final cinematic insult, dedicating his film to one of the greats, Andrei Tarkovsky, a credit not necessarily as glib or blasphemous as presumed. Antichrist might be an elaborate joke, but it is anything but a shallow one.

Film review: Moon

2009-12-30T09:17:00.002+11:00

Director: Duncan Jones
Cast: Sam Rockwell
Country: UK

The silent loneliness of space seems long forgotten in science fiction of the last two decades, more obsessed as the genre has been with the noisy theatrics of space opera since Stars Wars in 1977. A few films both before and after have defied that populist approach to big screen, high concept action, instead pursuing the conceit – in one way or another – where in space no-one can hear you scream when crazy shit goes down. Even before Ridley Scott informed us on this piece of trivia, film such as Solyaris (1972), Silent Running (1972) and 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) had already warned that the infinite, black vacuum was not the safest of playgrounds for the fragile human psyche. And now here in 2009 we find ourselves propelled back to that golden age of hard space sci-fi with Moon, a film that wears its cinephilia on its sleeve, masking the brilliant manipulations is deploys.

Sam Rockwell plays Sam Bell, a man incarcerated by his job on the far side of the Moon, the sole supervisor of a mining facility. At some point in the not wholly distant future, mankind (or rather a company known as Lunar Industries) has solved the energy crisis thanks to a Hellium-3, a substance extracted from lunar rock that provides Earth with a pollution-free form of nuclear fusion. The mining is all largely automated and so Sam’s role is to be the human fixer at the facility and he is fact approaching the end of his three year tenure where his only companion is Hal-9000 reminiscent Gerty (voiced by Kevin Spacey), a computer with emoticons to express sardonic empathy for his human counterpart when called upon. Not all is well for Sam though, he seems to be getting ill, hallucinations haunt his waking hours and a broken satellite prevents him from communicating live with his wife and young daughter.

As this remarkable debut feature from Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie, begins to unfold with deeply satisfying and taut storytelling it becomes quite apparent that whilst derivative of its predecessors Moon has achieved a kind of cinematic self-awareness; and as a result stands tall as its own film, with its own ideas. Central to this is the highly talented, and wholly underappreciated Rockwell who is able to convey so much emotion with very little effort, wrinkled eyes masking an underlying well of sadness. For such an understated film, produced on a budget of merely US$5 million, Rockwell is the perfect star. Jones has made something akin to an agronomical masterpiece in filmmaking, with production, story and performance all in near perfect harmony, with a message that will resonate with thoughtful viewers for long after the credits have rolled.

Film review: Sin Nombre

2009-12-27T12:14:00.003+11:00

Director: Cary Fukunaga
Country: USA/Mexico

Every day we see news reports of malnourished, scared immigrants aboard ramshackle floatation devices, desperately chasing dreams of a new life. That we call them ‘boat people’ might assuage our own conscience but doesn’t change the reality that such people cling to what might sometimes be more suitably defined as driftwood. In the political arena they are a thorn in the side of governmental policy-makers and in the media they are merely fodder to be chewed in the daily cycle of 24-hour news. In Sin Nombre, Spanish for ‘without a name’, we are reminded that they are parents and children, each with their own story, compelling and heartbreaking in equal measure.

Director Cary Fukunaga’s remarkable debut feature tells the story of two not so nameless teenagers who risk their lives in the pursuit of the American Dream, one that doesn’t necessarily entail white picket fences and an SUV. Their dream is simply to escape the violence or poverty that surround and imprison them. Sayra is a young Honduran woman who, along with her father and uncle, embarks on the long trek across Central America by foot, boat and train to the North. Willy (Edgar Flores) is a teenager attempting to escape real-life gang Mara Salvatrucha after its leader murders his girlfriend from a rival neighbourhood. It is on top a northbound train, packed by similarly anonymous immigrants, that their paths cross and friendship is kindled.

Fukunaga expertly weaves politics, love, drama and violence into his own script and is rewarded with some breathless performances from his young cast. Evoking memories of City Of God’s baby gangsters and the grit of Amores Perros’ first chapter, Sin Nombre proves as visually assured and as rich in composition as it is in story. With the devil in the details, Fukunaga leaves little room for doubt of his familiarity with the subject matter so filled is the journey with nuances of the trails and perils lying along the road. As Sin Nombre grounds to its inevitable end never for a moment does it become anything less than engrossing, giving names to the nameless, leaving a mark on your soul long after the credits have rolled.

Deconstructing Larry: An interview with Lars von Trier

2009-11-25T20:08:00.005+11:00

I recently interviewed Lars von Trier via video Skype and I must say it was one of the most unexpected interview experiences I've had in eight years as a film journalist. Not just because I was talking to one of the most interesting filmmakers of the past two decades, but because the man himself was not close to how I had perhaps expected. Physically, he seemed timid, thinning hair greying in colour, puffy cheeked, shoulders slouched, gripping his assistant chair as his voice trembled throughout the interview. For those who know me I'm hardly the most intimidating person to talk with or be interviewed by.

Below is the product of out 20 minute chat, which I found fascinating, insightful and deeply personal. I apologise for all the obvious missed follow-up questions, of which I can see plenty (what does he mean it would be "lying" to not present the graphic sex and violence?), but there was such a limited time and so many things I wanted to try and cover. The finished article was written up for Street Press Australia and I believe made the cover of Inpress in Melbourne (a shorter version was also printed in Drum Media).

I won't pass any further comment on the content, instead I leave that to you...

It’s seven months since the film premiered in Cannes, how do you feel now you have some distance between you and the initial reactions?

Well, I must say I understand the film less and less the more time that goes. I’ve made quite a lot of interviews and I think I’m getting much poorer at it. The negative reception in Cannes was fine with me, I don’t have a problem with that. I’ve been yelled at before.

Were you surprised by the hysteria?

Yeah, I don’t think I had prepared myself enough for that, which was stupid.

One of the common accusations is that the film is ‘needlessly graphic' – do you find that oddly contradictory given your reputation as a provocateur?

[Deep sign] You know, 'needlessly graphic'? Of course it depends on how you work. The normal saying is that you should show as little as possible to let these things exist in the mind or the brain of the spectator and thereby making them much stronger. For me it was never a question whether to have this graphicness both in the sex and the violence, somehow I thought it would be lying not to put it there.

Do you think accusations that ‘you wish to do nothing more than shock’ are unfair?

Well anything is fair to say but I don’t think it is right. I have worked all my life with films and I think shocking is quite poor is that is all you want to do or provoke. I believe there is much more in the films and that my work is… well, if I should shock or provoke someone I will still claim that I provoke myself with these things. But not the graphicness, it is maybe more natural to this country.

You surrendered a lot of control over this film shoot than previously, how important to your development as a filmmaker was stepping out of your comfort zone in this way?

It was interesting but it was not of my own free will I did that. I suffered from depression and I was just working myself out of this by doing the film work. I just didn’t have the strength or sharpness that I think I used to have.

You have said this is your most personal film to date, do you feel a sense of relief or does baring your demons in such a way unnerve you further?

I don’t really feel so strongly about it. It’s made in a very automatic way and if you are a normal human being then you would be very, very scared that this is what would come out of you if you just relaxed but I’m hardcore (laughs). I’ve been trying to work with this tilted brain of mine for many years so nothing, I think, can really shock me.

It is nothing new for artists suffering depression to turn to self-portraits as a reflex to the anxiety and frustration they feel. To what extent then is Antichrist a Lars von Trier self-portrait?

Well, to a certain degree, but I have always made [self-portraits] in that when I write I always put a little or a lot of myself into the characters, I think, or at least I am told, that is my method. If it gets even more of a self-portrait people will run screaming away, which they do already.

In that case, on reflection, do you have an awareness of how that manifests itself in the film?

No. To some point that is how we all have to deal with life.

There’s always much talk about the apparent misogyny present in your films, do you feel you have a healthy grip on your conscious and unconscious relationship with women?

Who has? (laughs) I don’t know, I’m doing my best. My mother was quite a prominent feminist in this country and she if she had not been cremated she would probably be turning in her grave.

You found out your father wasn’t your biological father as your mum was about to pass away – how old were you at this time?

I was quite old, I think I was 30.

It is a life-changing moment for any person this sort of revelation as I know from personal experience, how do you think that experience with your mother informed your relationship with the women in your films?

Well that’s a good question. I haven’t really thought very much about that. You know this situation where you find out your dad is not your biological dad is very common as you know. Just after you find out it was very severe for me and it was a great shock. But I think the longer that goes the more you find out what matters is the man who was there and not the guy who was not. It is very clear from my even more loving relationship with the guy I call my father, that did not deliver the genes, than I did before. It’s very strange about my mother that she kept this a secret because in her beliefs such things should not be kept secret, but it’s quite interesting how bourgeoisie these free-minded people also are.

Have you found any closure in this?

I don’t know. Have you met your real father?

Yes, it was a good, yet somehow unsatisfactory experience.

When I met my father he was extremely unsympathetic and I couldn’t see how I had anything in common with him whatsoever, only the fact that we looked like each other. It was a very negative meeting I had. Later on I found I had siblings from his side who I see now. I had a fantasy about the meeting where we would cry and embrace and it was nothing like that, I tell you. He told me any further contact should be through his lawyer. That was quite hard.

Has it altered your certainty about yourself?

If you believe I have any certainty (laughs). It is good to have some kids and a family, I wouldn’t say I am really certain of anything but I appreciate the qualities of the family life when you have a very turbulent job. I’m beginning to become very much of a sissy, I’m beginning to feel the pressure to make a film, or how a film should be and received. A few years ago I would have denied that for certain. I don’t know what happens, maybe I should just stop.

But then how would you go about managing that uncertainty?

Yeah, I think the biggest problem then is what I should do because just doing nothing is just really bad for me. I have to do something passionate, I don’t know what it could be.

[police sirens]

What is that?

There’s a police station around the corner…

Oh, well you are safe then (laughs).

How does grappling with your own demons inform your approach to exploring the dark recesses of the human condition?

It’s something I do not analyse very much. A film comes to me very much as an idea and then it develops, I’m really not steering it in any specific direction. I feel myself a little bit as a medium in the sense that by following my own thoughts and what you would say is a register of films that I like from when I saw a lot of films, these two things and following my own path without really deciding what the path is. I strongly feel I am following a path with what I am doing and the luxury of being able to follow that path without too much hesitation is a luxury that very few directors have in the sense I can actually finance these films and nobody tells me what to do. And since I this position I have a strong sense I have to use this possibility.

Do you ever wonder if all this will be the making of you or your ruin?

No, I don’t think so. I think I would have been an even sicker person had I not made films, yes, I’m quite sure. When we play Monopoly in Denmark we have a little card that says go directly to the police station and turn yourself in. That would be kinda easy for you… I’m sorry, it was just an idea.

Film review: A Serious Man

2009-11-18T10:35:00.005+11:00

Director: Joel and Ethan Coen
Cast: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Fred Melamed
Country: Coensville, USA
Year: 2009

When the truth is found to be lies, and all the joy within you dies... Rabbi Marshak

There ought to be a support group for characters of Coen brother’s movie, so tormented are the lives and experiences of such an existence. After the Oscar-winning success of their last masterpiece No Country For Old Men the filmmakers turned their sights to the farcical with Burn After Reading, a film about greed and the self-absorbed. With their latest effort, A Serious Man, the Coens turn their deadpan absurdity levels to 11 for latest victim Larry Gopnik (Michael Struhlbarg), a married, physics teacher with a couple of kids in a Jewish enclave of 1967 suburban Minnesota; a man to whom Very Bad Things are about to happen.

The irony is not lost in the film’s title, nor is it within all that occurs. Life, the Coen’s would have us believe, is a force of natural too unpredictable to be taken seriously no matter how hard we try and no matter whatever certainty we may think exists. Gopnik is a man to whom the status quo is religion in a world where God might just be too cruel a force to allow such malaise to go unchecked.

For Gopnik things start out bad and get progressively worse, and worse, and worse. First his wife Judith (Sari Lennick) announces she is leaving him for his recently widowed pompous pal Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed), his redneck neighbour appears combustible while his deadbeat brother has taken up residence in his living room when not frequently bars of dubious moral. Add to this a son newly acquainted with the teenage harlot Mary Jane, a daughter stealing money for a nose job, a tenure committee meeting to decide his job while someone writes anonymous letters slandering him and a failing Korean student who simultaneously brides him and threatens to sue him. So it is at the behest of his lawyer that Gopnik turns to religion for counsel.

Strange it has taken the Coens so long to turn the focus of their dark sense of humour so squarely on their Jewish roots for material, making up for lost time the brothers consciously run riot. As Gopnik seeks the advice of one Rabbi and then another, he discovers little more than abstract fables that provide little in the way of answers and more in the way of questions. God, if he exists, might not be a cruel master so much as he is an ambivalent one with a surreal sense of humour.

Fatalism becomes all prevailing, providing further evidence that when it comes to the human condition there are few storytellers with a keener, darker eye than the Coens. Funny though it might be, A Serious Man is a resolutely uncomfortable experience and deserving of a place amidst Joel and Ethan’s finest work.

Film review: Cedar Boys

2009-08-15T10:56:00.006+10:00

Director: Serhat Caradee
Cast: Les Chantery, Buddy Dannoun, Waddah Sari
Country: Australia
Year: 2009

A big hit at the Sydney Film Festival this year, Cedar Boys sees first-time feature writer-helmer Serhat Caradee join the ranks of filmmakers attempting to take the path less explored of Australia’s non-white (sub)urban experience. As the film’s title suggests, Caradee story focuses on young Lebanese men, though to call them such would be misleading as these are just boys waking the fine line of responsible adulthood and the recklessness naivety of youth. So of course, because no one seems to have an original idea for how to tell these stories, we find ourselves in the territory of crime, drugs and gangs again in what is a very competent, if obvious, drama.

Les Chantery plays Tarek, a young Lebanese-Australian lad who makes what little cash he can as a panel beater whilst living at home with his parents and little sister. At night Tarek can be found cruising around in his mate Nabil’s (Buddy Dannoun) car or getting turned away from upscale clubs because their money’s not green enough and their skin’s not white enough. Tarek’s a good kid who finds himself tempted by another life in Sydney, one of big houses in the Eastern suburbs and flashy white girls who drink champagne. Furthermore, Tarek’s has a brother in the clink with no money left for his appeal. It’s enough for the young lad to compromise his character and get involved with Nabil’s plan to rip off a dealer’s stash and use their hustler mate Sam (Waddah Sari) to shift the pills.

Thus Caradee embarks on a moral tale about kids who think getting rich quick the illegal way will come without consequences. The director tells his story well and there is just enough room for one more western suburbs story after David Field’s The Combination earlier this year. But with those films and Shawn Seet’s boxing drama Two Fists, One Heart it’s starting to feel like the only immigrant stories involve criminals, boys from the wrong side of the tracks and love stories with white Aussie girls. Are there no young Lebanese women in this world we're being served?

Unfortunately not, and until Australian filmmakers start trying to tell their stories without the baggage of imitating American urban filmmakers’ gangland-immigrant tales it’s going to continue to feel like old ground revisited. That there are gifted writers, directors and actors out there to explore the cultural concerns of these groups and that they are being giving the opportunities to do so is undeniably a good thing; Cedar Boys is a decent enough showcase for this talent, but let’s see something fresh, imaginative, original.

What Cedar Boys demonstrates is that on a small budget with the Red hi-def cam you can make a film that looks great and captures an Australia city and outer suburbs in a way that is at times menacing and others magical. Go see Cedar Boys, it is accomplished work featuring an incredible cast (Rachael Taylor, Martin Henderson, Daniel Amalm) by a filmmaker with a bright future.

Film review: Balibo

2009-08-15T10:44:00.009+10:00

Director: Robert Connolly
Cast: Anthony LaPaglia, Oscar Isaac, Damon Gameau
Country: Australia
Year 2009

Robert Connolly’s third feature is a historical political thriller of rare quality, not just in terms of Australian filmmaking but on any. Taking us back to the 1975 Indonesian invasion of East Timor Connolly and his co-writer David Williamson (Gallipoli) refuse to pull their punches yet intelligently avoid sermonising the Australian government’s culpability in turning a blind eye, effectively condemning six Australian journalists to death. Based on Jill Jolliffe’s 2001 book Cover Up, Balibo is powerfully affecting cinema and a compelling piece of storytelling.

The film opens with a Timorese woman giving her oral history at the recent Timor-Leste Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation in which she recalls witnessing the execution of Australian journalist Roger East. Played by the rock solid Anthony LaPaglia, we first meet East as he is eagerly encouraged by a young Timorese patriot José Ramos-Horta (Oscar Isaac) to head the government’s news agency. Jaded and cynical, East is not to be convinced easily and only comes round when his own buried idealism gets the better of his world weary instinct.

Arriving to find Dili a capital city under siege with Indonesia intelligence wondering the streets in civilian clothes, East is more interested in picking up the trail of the five missing young Australian journos in order to discover their fate. Balibo expertly weaves together two storylines, that of Greg Shacklton, Gary Cunningham, Malcolm Rennie, Brian Peters and Tony Stewart reporting from the frontline whilst East investigates their fate. Despite knowing the men’s ultimate fate, Balibo never misses a beat of tension, the impending spectre of death always looming claustrophobically overhead.

The film’s narrative echoes the sentiment offered by East, that the only way he can get the Australian public interested in the plight of the East Timorese is by exposing the fate of the Balibo Five, much to Ramos-Horta’s distaste. Along the road to the titular village where the Five met their ultimate end we see the results of Indonesian death squads, whose activities resulted in the murder of thousands of civilians. Balibo is anything but a film without conviction, its anger palpable and uncompromising, leaving the audience unable to ignore the spectre of crimes committed and the implications of the Australian government’s inaction.

And while Balibo is an intensely political film, it is also a beautiful one. Nick Meyer’s editing between the two timelines is nothing short of masterful and more than appropriately complemented by Tristan Milani’s photography on both 16mm and 35mm. Milani deploys handheld camera work for the most part in all the right places, beautifully colour contrasting the duelling stories and capturing the lush, exotic locales of East Timor. It is always a pleasure to see filmmaking of such calibre in sync with storytelling and performance.

Director Connolly has made a remarkable film, equal to Oliver Stone’s Salvador, arguably that filmmaker’s best work, and is a reminder to Australia that with great power comes great responsibility. The Balibo Five and Roger East died trying to report the truth, the very least we can do is stand up and pay attention.

Film review: Bronson

2009-08-15T10:38:00.005+10:00

Director: Nicolas Winding Refn
Cast: Tom Hardy, Matt King, Kelly Adams
Country: United Kingdom
Year: 2009

“My name’s Charles Bronson and all my life I’ve wanted to be famous,” comes the narration from the anti-hero of director Nicholas Winding Refn Sydney Film Festival Official Comp winner. Bronson is a film that offers perilously little else than a character portrait of Britain’s most infamous inmate played by Tom Hardy. And for those who value story over art that probably won't be enough, nevertheless Bronson has ‘cult classic’ written all over it thanks to it’s coiled tension and eventual balls-to-the-wall violence.

Refn, whose Pusher trilogy is another revered collection from the cult section, paints his portrait of a fascinating man with a Kubrickian brush, unapologetically repetitive in its explorations of a life behind bars and man incapable of, or uninterested in, rehabilitation into normal society. A squat fist of muscle with a shaved head and an English moustache, Refn’s Bronson is an intelligent, creative and at times vulnerable man who is nothing if not intensely wild, whimsical and interesting. His world becomes a bizarre vaudevillian affair beset by equally odd characters along the way from a prize-fight promoter, to an art teacher, to a particularly peculiar prison warden.

It all comes as a surprise to anyone from British shores more accustomed to the man born Michael Gordon Peterson whom after being imprisoned for armed robbery became known as the country’s most dangerous criminal, remaining in jail for 40 years (aside a couple of very short stints of freedom) as a result of crimes committed inside. One of the strengths of Bronson is director Refn decision to tell his story through the a tint lens of absurdity and leave the audience to work out how they feel about the ruffian for themselves.

Whilst no doubt capturing his charm, humour and raising questions about the rights and wrongs of institutionalising a man through years of solitary confinement, the filmmaker is never shies away from the brutality of this somewhat deranged and feral character who cannot be defined by normal society. Was he born this way or did prison and society’s limitations of social-acceptability shape him into the man he became?

Bronson is a deeply confronting film in respect of it subject and no matter what your opinion of its value the one feature uniformly agreeable is the stunning central performance by Hardy as the brawler. Previously only seen in bit parts in the likes of Layer Cake, Marie Antoinette and RocknRolla Hardy delivers a text book definition of a tour de force that is both mesmerising and terrifying and a performance that deserves to be talked about in the same vein of Eric Bana’s similar role in Chopper – utterly magnificent.

For 92 minutes Bronson sets out to entertain us with visual flair and a reek of madness. In the process it succeeds in becoming one of the most original and exciting biopics in recent memory and a scary insight into what may lie beneath humanity: little more than survival of the fittest instincts that betray our animalistic tendencies. Or it might just be a wild ride in the mind of a madman.

Film review: Inglourious Basterds

2009-08-15T10:33:00.005+10:00

Director: Quentin Tarantino
Cast: Brad Pitt, Diane Kruger, Christoph Waltz
Country: USA
Year: 2009

What’s that you say: a Quentin Tarantino-directed World War II film about a Dirty Dozen-esque troupe of Jewish American soldiers behind enemy lines with the sole purpose of killing Nazis? As basic movie premises go it’s hard to imagine a bigger fanboy wet dream really, but be careful what you wish for, because you might not get it. Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds is the least disciplined and most wildly uneven of his seven features to date.

Hardly one to dwell on his detractors, here the film geek’s filmmaker betrays what should be his own directorial maturing process and indulges his worst excesses. And while the big chin might be likened in many quarters as The Weinstein Company’s Mickey Mouse; the difference remains that Mickey didn’t have an ego and tens of millions of dollars at his direct disposal. Most disappointingly of all, Inglourious Basterds glaringly lacks for consistent inspiration.

Rather than the action movie about a crack(pot) team of scalping Basterds led by Brad Pitt’s Lt. Aldo Raine, Tarantino has delivered a series of vignettes, padded by lots of talking with quintessential QT-patter and punctuated by increasingly violent exclamation marks. It is a farcical fairy tale set in Nazi-occupied France where the history books have been gleefully thrown on the pyre so as to enact a roaring rampage of revenge. Disturbingly though, Inglourious Basterds plays uncomfortably well as a 160-minute murder fantasy in which human life means very little in this post-Gitmo world.

Because no filmmaker loses their gifts overnight Tarantino still manages to cram some vintage stuff into his bloated runtime (you’d hope so, right?). The opening homage to Sergio Leone’s Once Upon A Time In The West, complete with Ennio Morriocone score to a homestead invasion, fused with classic Tarantino cat and mouse dialogue play is as good as any of the writer-director’s greatest hits. The scene excruciatingly drip-drops the tension before climaxing with exactly the execution we’ve come to expect of his violent poetics.

It is also during this opening sequence that Tarantino unleashes his secret weapon, German actor Christoph Waltz as ‘the Jew Hunter’ SS Colonel Hans Landa. Waltz steals every single scene in which he delivers his cunning dialogue in multiple languages, playing pitch perfectly for the uncertain bedfellows of terror and comedy. Where Waltz excels Pitt fails in a grimacing and gurning in a caricaturing that irritates more than it delights.

Because it’s an ensemble we could go on to mention the other standouts like Michael Fassbender and Mélanie Laurent, but it’s hard to care when the director himself barely treats his protagonists as anything more than a collection of names and faces. All the easier to kill one supposes. Tarantino has not lost any of his visual flare nor his talent with language, but here finds his storytelling lacking in restraint to his film’s detriment. There’s entertainment to be had in this escapist fantasy, but be warned, these are not the Basterds you’re looking for.

Worse Addictions: Episode 5

2009-07-03T11:45:00.005+10:00

The podcast is still going strong, check out EPISODE FIVE after reading the synopsis.

"Things got pretty heated as the team took on Michael Bay's latest helping of pyrotechnical cinema Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen. Adrenaline flowed and spittle flew as Josh Wheatley, Daniel Crichton-Rouse and Damien Radford joined Scott Henderson for a marathon discussion of Michael Bay as auteur before naturally seguewaying into a chat about Can't Say No challenge film Happy Together. There's a chance for you to WIN a copy of Guy Maddin's My Winnipeg just before listening to the team discuss Manhunter in our Michael Mann Body Of Lies series."

Film review: Bastardy

2009-07-03T11:36:00.003+10:00

Director: Amiel Courtin-Wilson
Country: Australia
Year: 2008 (documentary)

“When you’re pushed out on stage, that’s when you’re born” Jack Charles

Indigenous actor Jack Charles is a rare sort of fellow and his story quite remarkable. Captured in documentary form by director Amiel Courtin-Wilson (Chasing Buddha) over the course of seven years it’s hard to say how close you come to knowing what really makes Charles tick, he’s a master of charisma yet slave to vice. Unflinchingly and candid from beginning to end with one uncomfortable exception, and yet nothing short of an enigma; Bastardy presents one of the most fascinatingly understated portraits of a man in recent memory.

As a prolific actor who starred on screen and stage and is credited as having set up the first Aboriginal theatre company in the 1960s one expects a certain sense of the theatrical around Charles. Life started out that way too. A member of the The Stolen Generation might have been the first really drama he experienced and an onscreen credit at the end of the film tells us it is dedicated to those who have been “lost and found.” The allusion is clear, this isn’t just about those who fall on hard times and find themselves in the homeless nether-regions of the living; ghosts before death even comes for them.

But that’s the bigger picture and Bastardy is much more concerned with the personal and the intimate. Down the years Charles appeared on the big screen in films like The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978), Bedevil (1993) and Blackfellas (1993), in private he was a thief and a drug addicted – albeit the most charming bloke to invade you home, helping himself to whatever he might be able to maintain the lifestyle he’d grown accustomed – even if that was chasing the next fix.

Charles seemingly has given director Courtin-Wilson full access to his life, we see him shooting up heroin to which he displays no physical reaction – a skill born of years of addiction. Later the pair take a trip to a Melbourne suburb, home to the upper-class and a happy hunting ground for Charles’ exploits in cat-burglary. We see the alleyways and toilets he has slept in and hear about relationships gone wrong. All of it is so honest and without self-pity, yet there’s a sparkle of regret in his eyes that betrays the bravado. He is intelligent, kind, philosophical and a quite beautiful blues singer. There never a dull moment around Charles and the effect he has on the thesps and crew he meets on set at an acting gig or the drunks on a street bench – encounters with this man are always seem enriching experiences.

Bastardy navigates the ere tricky line of documenting the subject and becomes involved with the story. Incredible in many ways given the intoxicating bitter-sweetness of Charles’ life, his gentle demeanour and wise eloquence. A genuinely rewarding film in which you could talk about the skilled execution of the editing and the beauty of some of the photography at great length, but in the end all you’ll care about is Jack Charles, a charming rogue who’ll stay with you long after he’s left the screen.

Scott Henderson

Worse Addictions: Episode 4

2009-06-23T02:22:00.003+10:00

Hello my friends, obviously I've been somewhat tardy with my posting for the past couple of weeks. The podcast if taking up vast amounts of my time as is various freelance gigs I've been able to pick up. Below is the overview for EPISODE 4 of WORSE ADDICTIONS in which we review Disgrace and begin our exploration of Michael Mann in the new Body Of Lies feature. Please remember to subscribe via iTunes, and do feel free to email your feedback and thoughts to worseaddictions@gmail.com

"Despite the editor's failure to bring the power cord for his laptop the Worse Addictions team were able to record episode 4 of the show with the help of a super speedy second half. Alex Parker and Matt Riviera returned to the studio – much to the relief of Scott Henderson and Josh Wheatley – in time to review the new Australian film DISGRACE, directed by Steve Jacobs and starring John Malkovich. The guys (and gal) open the show by talking about Alex's recommendation for film viewing in hospital and Josh's latest DVD purchases. They also introduce our new trailer competition, the Can't Say No feature where one of the team challenges someone to watch a unseen film before the next episode and finally we kick start our Body Of Lies feature on Michael Mann. Hope you enjoy the show folks and please come back next week when we review Transformers 2."

Trailer for The Warriors Way

2009-06-10T12:55:00.004+10:00

I don't normally post trailers but this one was an absolute must see. It came via 24FPS and looks like an unendorsed promo release of the English language samurai western (most samurai films are actually westerns but this one is actually set in the Wild West). The film is directed by Sngmoo Lee and stars Korean actor Dung-Kun Jang as the retired 'World's Greatest Swordsman Ever'. And Jang is not the only talent we should mention with Kate Bosworth, Geoffrey Rush and Danny Huston (hamming it up in all the right ways) providing some serious star power to the cast. Quite frankly this looks incredible, drawing on several genres and influences like Hard Boiled, The Crow (think the strobing shootout), Yojimbo, A Fistful Of Dollars and anything involving bullet time bad-assery. Watch it below or click here.

Type rest of the post here

SFF review: Burma VJ

2009-06-09T19:33:00.004+10:00

Director: Anders Østergaard
Country: Denmark

"Those who are not afraid come to the front” – unknown protester

“All social changes come from the passions of individuals.” After nearly a decade of pessimistic ‘we’re all doomed’ documentaries of despair things might be changing for the better. Whilst many of the features at the 56th Sydney Film Festival have shown a distinct pattern of fatalistic discourse, this comment by a subject in Louie Psihoyos’ The Cove reflects the optimistic hope evident in many of the documentary films showing this year.

In Burma VJ: Reporting From A Closed Country it is more than simply the passion of one person, but the bravery of a group of undercover journalists who operate at all times under the threat of permanent incarceration or worse. They are all members of the Democratic Voice of Burma based in Rangoon where they do everything they can to capture footage of the country’s military dictatorship’s activities and smuggling their elicit goods to a headquarters in Norway. These are video journalists as freedom fighters, where high street camcorders replace rocket launchers and “stories are silent.”

Director Anders Østergaard cuts together footage of the 2007 rebellion led by Burma’s 400,000 Buddhist monks along with the dramatic recreations of DVB journalist Joshua’s (alias) experience hold up in Thailand at the time of the almost-revolution and whose role was to managed the flow of information to the outside world. It’s a problematic decision but for the most part you take Joshua at his word as he tells his comrades story.

What plays out in the film’s grainy home video footage is some of the most incredible scenes of revolt and repression ever captured charting it from beginning to end. The last time the people of Burma rose up against the military in 1988 some 3,000 people were killed in the streets and the film is soaked in fear and tension for the intrepid reporters. Aside the bravery of the reporters who must dodge secret police hiding in the crowds, the monks who march on the capital in their thousands and the student activists who march despite fear the military will fire on them, there is something heartbreakingly inspirational about the intangibles caught on camera here.

The DVB remind us of the role of good journalism in exposing atrocities (and believe me, you will see tragedy) and the truth behind the oppression of a people, with the simultaneous realism how negligent our own media has proved in recent times. Burma VJ is nail-bitingly tense, utterly engrossing and incredible galvanising. More than simply documenting this event the film offers hope in the indomitable nature of the human spirit that refuses to go quietly into the night no matter the consequences.

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56th Sydney Film Festival runs until 14 June

Worse Addictions: Episode 2

2009-06-09T15:50:00.004+10:00

So the second episode of WORSE ADDICTIONS has been posted online. It was a pretty crazy production and editing job as we've all been super busy with the Sydney Film Festival, but I think we made some progress from the first episode and we certainly had some good discussions about the three films we reviewed: BRONSON, VAN DIEMEN'S LAND and 500 DAYS OF SUMMER. I'm trying to knock together some written review to post here at the blog. My favourite film so far has been documentary The Cove, which I can't recommend highly even and rambled about a little too much during the episode. Anyways, go check it out, download it, subscribe to iTunes – all the links should be working.

Also, Matt Riviera is running a critic poll of the films showing at the festival on his blog Last Night With Riviera in which I am taking part. Swing by there to see what have been mine and a number of other critics favourite films so far.

The Sydney Film Festival ends 14 June, so hurry over to the website to book your tickets now.

Film review: Terminator Salvation

2009-06-03T12:01:00.004+10:00

Director: McG
Cast: Christian Bale, Sam Worthington, Moon Bloodgood
Country: USA

"So that's what death tastes like." – Marcus Wright

It was hard to imagine a more meaningless addition to a cinematic franchise after Underworld: Rise Of The Lycans. Kudos then to McG and the ‘creative’ team behind Terminator Salvation for such a valiant effort: not only have they managed to neuter a once genuinely terrifying vision of the apocalypse, but they have done so in a way that inspires little more than apathy for all involved. In fact, if this John Connor is the man they’ve been crooning about for 25 years then frankly we’ve been conned because apparently he couldn’t inspire so much as a story in a room full of writers.

Traditionally this is the point at the reviewer gets into some synopsis of the film, which is all well and good, but there are some many holes perforating John Brancato and Michael Ferris’ (the geniuses behind Catwoman and The Net) script it would take a thesis to explain it all. Not that they haven’t tried, starting off the film with exposition in title cards, forging on with voice-over narration and rubber stamped with dialogue straight out of daytime soap territory.

For your benefit: a man on death row, Marcus Wright (Aussie Worthington), signs his body over to Cyberdyne to for scientific research in the year 2003. Fast-forward to 2018, a computer defence network Skynet (develop by Cyberdyne) has become self aware and nuked humankind almost to extinction. The resistance leader is a man named John Connor (Bale, scowling/growling/dreadful) and he is trying to find another man called Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin) who he will eventually send back in time to protect/shag his mother so that he can be his dad. All the while there are machines that take the form of planes, motorbikes, water snakes and terminators (pretty much anything you can welt a machine gun to) working hard to eliminate humans. Oh yeah, turns out Wright is a machine who thinks he’s a man and may be the resistance’s only hope, or something metaphorical, sorta.

The resulting film takes itself so seriously it is left utterly lifeless and is so devoid of likeable characters that any supposed tension is striped from the relentless action sequences. Not only that but everything is derivative of/ripped off Every Other Post Apocalypse War Movie Ever right down a pointless mute child called Star; it may as well be one of those genre parodies, which works because they aren’t funny either.

Asking lofty questions like “doesn’t everyone deserve a second shot” while single-handedly sending girl power back to the 50s (tough as nails female fighter falls instantly in love with Wright, Connor’s wife is a pregnant doctor) Terminator Salvation fails to accomplish anything other than blowing shit up bigger than ever before and more frequently. If this is the best of humanity has to offer then perhaps it isn’t worth saving after all.

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Terminator Salvation is released nationally in Australia 4 June, but only go if you can't get tickets for the Sydney Film Festival, actually I wouldn't bother going at all...

New Australia Film Podcast: Worse Addictions

2009-06-02T10:54:00.005+10:00

Hello friends, the past week has been a fairly insane time for me as I've been educating myself on audio editing and familiarising myself with a new website backend AND preparing myself for the Sydney Film Festival. Anyway, the result is that I have launched a new film podcast with the help of a few friends, it's called WORSE ADDICTIONS and if you click the name through to the site you'll be able to download our first episode previewing the 56th Sydney Film Festival. The site is still a work in progress as are my hosting skills. We'll be recording new episodes during the festival and on a weekly basis from here on out. Please leave feedback in the Worse Addictions 'episodes' comments section, we'd love to hear what you think.

Scott

What's On This Weekend

2009-05-29T09:52:00.003+10:00

Thought I'd give you an update on what's new at cinemas this weekend:

Adventureland
Released this weekend supposedly, for some bizarre reason I can't find it listed at Dendy, Greater Union or Palace. If you know more/better than I leave a comment. I wasn't kind in my review, but it's a nice sort of trip down memory lane if you grew up in the 80s, has one or two good laughs and a few sweet moments. It just left me feeling empty.
I'd recommend reading AO Scott's thoughtful and more measured review over at the NY Times before making up your mind, "Somehow the story of a young man’s coming of age never gets old, at least when it is told with the kind of sweetness and intelligence Adventureland displays."

My Year Without Sex
Australia film from writer/director Sarah Watt (Look Both Ways) which I has heard roundly good things about. Tells the story of a mother who has a brain aneurism and as a result can't work, help the kids with school stuff, drive or have sex for one year. The synopsis sounds depressing, but as the title suggest I suspect this one has a healthy sense of (black) humour. I haven't seen it, but these guys have:
Michael Adams, Empire: "Funny, moving, tense and entertaining, it's a strong follow-up to the sublime Look Both Ways."
Thomas Caldwell, Cinema Autopsy: "an intelligent, endearing and recognisable depiction of contemporary Australian families."

State Of Play
This one I have seen, it's a fun thriller if you don't mind be treated like a bit of an idiot, plot twists telegraphed a mile away and some slightly out-of-date pontificating on Real Journalism vs Bloggers or the dangers of privately owned Blackwater-esque military. Directed by the excellent Kevin MacDonald (Touching The Void, Last King Of Scotland), this is a perfectly serviceable thriller starring Russell Crowe (whose pretty good) and Rachel McAdams (who spends the movie being patronised and cute). But don't take my word for it:
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian: "the movie is an entertaining ride, with a big cast of characters whose contributions to the plot, though not strictly speaking plausible, are all cleverly managed and orchestrated by Macdonald."

Other films still on release I recommend: Gomorrah, Synecdoche, New York, and Aussie Cannes winner Samson & Delilah (my Australia film of the year so far). Anyone else got suggestions?

Film review: Adventureland

2009-05-28T12:49:00.003+10:00

Director: Greg Mottola
Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart, Ryan Reynolds
Country: USA

"We are doing the work of lazy morons" – James

Remember that summer when it seemed like everyone had lost their virginity except for you? Or perhaps that summer job you hated but situated you around a cool group of people for one last blast of adolescent fun? And then there was that girl, the one you’ll remember for the rest of your life as the first you really fell for and who inexplicably may have fallen for you too? Greg Mottola (Superbad) does and he isn’t afraid to take us on a trip down memory lane to share his story.

Adventureland stars Jesse Eisenberg as James who, fresh out of college and still in possession of his cherry, takes a job in a carnival to save for his post-grad tuition after his alcoholic father suffers a fall from working grace. The girl is Kristen Stewart who plays the gorgeous, if distant, Em. Certainly Stewart has the looks and cute ticks of a girl who could steal you heart, but her stockpile is starting to look very limited. Likewise Eisenberg, who now seems like a poor man’s Michael Cera before there was a Michael Cera, struggles to pull off a truly engaging character here.

The two leads are not alone either because Mottola, who smashed the ball out the park with Superbad, fails to capture any of the magical potential of this dilapidated carnival in Pittsburgh, preferring instead to bombard the audience with a 80s soundtrack and bodily humour. When the neatly tied ending finally arrives it feels neither satisfying nor particularly earned.

---
Adventureland is released in Australian cinema Thursday, 28 May
This review also appears in 3D World

Sydney Film Festival jury update

2009-05-27T15:20:00.003+10:00

I love that I'm giving you my first Sydney Film Festival update before I've even written my launch preview (I did already write one for 3D World so it's not like I've been entirely lazy). The festival announced today that joining Australian director and Jury President Rolf de Heer in selecting the Official Competition winner will be Australian actress Miranda Otto and Danish director Lone Scherfig whose feature An Education is also the Closing Night film.

Last year's 55th Sydney Film Festival was the first time it had held a competition as part of the event, which this year runs from 3-14 June. Last year it was Steve McQueen's much-vaunted Hunger that took home the $60,000 prize off the back of winning the Un Certain Regard in Cannes. It's extremely hard to pick an early front runner this year but my money is increasingly on Rachel Ward's Australian film Beautiful Kate, a completely blind prediction mind you.

Full press release after the bump, and keep your eyes on Dark Habits for more Sydney Film Festival news, previews and reviews and some other exciting developments. I gotta dash, got a date with a Terminator...

***PRESS RELEASE***

MIRANDA OTTO AND LONE SCHERFIG JOIN SYDNEY FILM FESTIVAL
OFFICIAL COMPETITION JURY

Australian actress Miranda Otto and Danish director Lone Scherfig will join Jury
President Rolf de Heer as judges of the Official Competition at this year’s Sydney
Film Festival.

The 12 films in the competition will screen across the festival and then the winning
film will be awarded the Sydney Film Prize at the festival’s Closing Night Gala
Screening of An Education, directed by juror Lone Scherfig (14 June 2009).

“I am really proud to announce that two outstanding women will join Jury President
Rolf de Heer on the Official Competition Jury. Miranda Otto and Lone Scherfig bring
great intelligence and integrity to determining the winner of the Sydney Film Prize
from the twelve ‘courageous, audacious and cutting-edge’ films in the line-up” said
Clare Stewart, Festival Director today.

Miranda Otto is one of Australia’s leading international actresses, well known for her
role in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy – Return of the King and The Two Towers. She
appeared in the US series Cashmere Mafia and most recently she worked on the
upcoming Australian feature film Blessed.

“I’m excited to be able to immerse myself in this selection of bold and audacious
films, cinema often gives us a reflection of what is happening around the world at any
given point in time. To work with Rolf de Heer along with other members of the jury –
is a real honour,” said Miranda Otto today.

Lone Scherfig is the Danish director of An Education, starring Peter Sarsgaard,
Carey Mulligan and Emma Thompson. SFF’s Closing Night film, An Education is a
coming of age story about a teenage girl in 1960s suburban London, and how her life
changes with the arrival of a playboy nearly twice her age.

Born in Copenhagen, Lone has collected 22 awards for her work including a
FIPRESCI award and a Silver Bear Jury Prize at the 2001 Berlin Film Festival for
Italian for Beginners (2000). An Education is Scherfig’s second English language
film after Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself.

SFF’s Official Competition is now in its second year and offers the largest cash prize
for film in Australia. The FIAPF-accredited competition for ‘new directions in film’
rewards courageous and audacious filmmaking and is supported by Events NSW
with the $60,000 cash prize provided by Hunter Hall Investment Management.

The 12 Official Competition films are:

World premieres: Rachel Ward’s Beautiful Kate and Khoa Do’s Missing Water.

International premiere: Tsai Ming-liang’s Face (Visages)

Australian premieres: Ken Loach’s Looking for Eric, Sebastián Silvia’s The Maid
(La Nana), Steve Jacobs’ Disgrace, Peter Brosens and Jessica Hope’s Antiplano,
Nicholas Winding Refn’s Bronson, Gustave de Kervern and Benoit Delépine’s
Louise-Michel, Alexey German Jr’s Paper Soldier (Bumazhnyy Soldat), Henry
Selick’s Coraline, and Steven Soderbergh’s The Girlfriend Experience.

The final two jury members will be announced prior to the Opening Night Gala on 3
June. "

Hitchcock Till Ya Drop (Kino #26)

2009-05-26T16:31:00.007+10:00

Film journalism for me started out covering the digital filmmaking scene in Brighton, England for street press rag The Insight. I've always had a healthy interest in short films not just as an art form, but as a cultural movement. When I first moved to Sydney and heard about KINO, an underground open mic night for short filmmakers, I was there in a heartbeat ready for anything (and on any given night at Kino anything goes). So for those of you who haven't been before please let me encourage you to come check out the films or even get involved as Kino throws its twice annual KABARET event – a six-day Kino marathon split into three 48-hour stints of filmmaking, screenings and parties. Sound like something you'd be interested in?

Kabaret kicks off with Kino #26 (Hitchcockian-themed) on 29 June in Sydney and The Festivalists (the company behind Kino) is accepting applications from prospective writers, actors, crew and directors to come down and get involved. If you've never made a film before this is your perfect opportunity to pop your cherry, if you have it's a great opportunity to network and get the creative juices flowing. Registration for the event gives you access to the KINO LAB hosted by Metro Screen in Paddington and is fully kitted out with cameras, equipment and editing stations.

The whole short filmmaking festival runs until Saturday, 4 July with the second and third events David Lynch and Tim Burton themed respectively. Press release after the bump with more information on the event. I highly recommend signing up, and if not, then come down to one of the KINO KABARET screening and party, the first of which is taking place Tuesday, 30 June at Frase Studios in Chippendale, where drinks come with the door cover and the friendly faces are for free.

***PRESS RELEASE***
Kino Sydney is now calling for participants for KINO KABARET 2009, a series of filmmaking marathons, screenings and parties taking place across Sydney, June 29 – July 4 2009.

Whatever your level of experience, KINO KABARET invites you to team-up with other enthusiastic writers, directors, editors, actors and musicians to make short films in intense 48-hour sessions, each culminating in a screening and party.

For a minimal registration fee of only $15, participants will have access to a KINO LAB fitted with cameras, filmmaking equipment and editing stations, hosted by Metro Screen in Paddington Town Hall.

Artistic Director Matt Ravier explains: “Kino encourages participants to learn about the craft of filmmaking by creating short videos, unshackled by the burden of resources, time and money. Kino provides filmmakers of all backgrounds, abilities and experience with a support network to write, shoot and edit their projects as well as an opportunity to show the work to a large audience.”

“Kino offers an inclusive, non-competitive experience to give people a taste for filmmaking. Participants pool their resources, ideas, knowledge and equipment: amateurs mix with award-winners, artists mix with technicians, locals mix with out-of-towners… The result is unpredictable, the energy is contagious… and in true Kino spirit, the parties – which include live entertainment, snacks, giveaways and open bar - are awesome.”

The week-long filmmaking experiment is a special edition of Kino Sydney, an underground open-mic night for filmmakers which occurs monthly since 2006.

Each session lasts 48 hours and the enrolment fee is only $15 (including free entry to the screening and party). Registrations are open until June 22 and entry forms can be downloaded from www.kinosydney.com.

SCREENING PARTIES

Tuesday 30 June, 6:30pm | Fraser Studios, Chippendale | Dress code: Alfred Hitchcock
Thursday 2 July, 6:30pm | The Red Rattler, Marrickville | Dress code: David Lynch
Saturday 4 July, 6:30pm | St Stephens Church Hall, Newtown | Dress code: Tim Burton

ABOUT KINO SYDNEY

Kino Sydney is the Sydney chapter of the worldwide Kino filmmaking movement. It was started by Australian non-profit company The Festivalists in November 2006. Kino Sydney runs monthly short film nights as well as Kino Kabaret sessions once a year. The films screened at Kino Sydney are all world premieres made specifically for Kino.

Kino is an international low-budget filmmaking movement born in Montreal in 2000. There are now Kino chapters around the world and Australia hosts 2: Kino Sydney and Kino Adelaide.

For more information, please call Matt Ravier on 02 9281 5608, email matt@thefestivalists.com or visit www.kinosydney.com.

Film review: Last Ride

2009-05-25T18:23:00.008+10:00

Director: Glendyn Ivin
Cast: Hugo Weaving, Tom Russell, Anita Hegh
Country: Australia

"We're whoever we want to be" – Kev (Hugo Weaving)

The tagline for Last Ride asks: “are some bonds meant to be broken?” What becomes clear over the course of Glendyn Ivin’s visually eloquent coming-of-age drama is that his answer to this question is an unequivocal yes. However, while our arrival at this destination is inevitable, by the end of his film we recognise that regardless of necessity, it is no less difficult and heartbreaking when the time to break such bonds comes.

Based on Denise Young’s book of the same name Last Ride tells the story of 10-year-old Chook (Tom Russell) and his father Kev (Hugo Weaving) who are on the run from what we don’t know exactly. Abandoning their car and taking a bus to some small town they visit Maryanne (Anita Hegh), an old girlfriend of Kev, who is neatly used to deliver some breadcrumbs about the father and son’s backstory. Ivin uses several cues (mostly in the form of flashbacks that are a distraction) over the course of the film to feed absent pieces of the puzzle: why are they on the run?

In the end the ‘why’ isn’t really what’s important, it might be what sets Kev and Chook’s roadtrip in motion, but Last Ride is only a mystery in a superficial fashion and weakest when caught dwelling in circumstance as a narrative trick. What really matters is the relationship between a man ill-suited for fatherhood – left to carry the can when the mother of his child took a permanent leave of absence – and his son.

There are other questions specifically in regard to Kev given added dimension by the ‘why’ reveal. Weaving is formidable as the charming ex-con who struggles to control his temper; his relationship with Chook may appear simplistic at times yet it is anything but. It might even be that Chook has some understanding of this, that no matter how wrong relations between kin seem to those on the outside, on the inside there is part-acceptance, part-normalcy and also a large element of intrinsic (misplaced?) empathy.

Flawed though these relationships may be, the old adage of blood running thicker than water exists for a reason. It is worth noting then the most dramatic moment of fracture between Chook and his father takes place on the endless Lake Gairdner, a body of water shallow enough to be crossed by car or on foot, where the horizon the ceases to end. It is a moment of absolute loss and rebirth, where the umbilical connection is severed and Chook must find the strength to become his own man in-spite of his years.

And whilst many of the traditional on-the-road imagery is executed in checklist fashion, silhouettes and sunsets, campfires stories, rocky roads to nowhere, static wide-angle long shots of the cars crossing the landscape, it is in the Lake Gaidner sequence that Ivin finds a truly ethereal moment of cinematic beauty. His technique, whilst confident throughout, at times feels perfunctory and unambitious – then again it provides a style that allows the actors to do the heavy lifting and characters to unfold with a naturalism that only gets stronger as the film progresses.

Weaving’s Kev is barely sympathetic. His love for his son is unconditional and there are moments of tenderness and honesty that suggest in a different world, one that had been less cruel, things could have been very different. Questions of masculinity and paternal complexities always simmer beneath the surface for Kev, a product of the perception that he was an “inconvenience” to his own father. Then there is the time he spent in jail that has left him physically scarred but perhaps emotionally too (“[in prison] people take advantage of ya”). There’s little doubting that Kev is damaged goods himself, but the extremes to which he exercises his tough love go beyond any acceptable limits.

The things that define us can all too often become scapegoats for lives we never intended to choose. Ivin’s film is a reminder that it is possible to step outside the shadow of your father and forge your own path in life, refusing in the process to accept what has gone before as a circle to be repeated in the future. In the same breath it remains possible to learn from even the meanest of fathers, as Ivin’s final shot rather cumbersomely punctuates, the question is instead how can we incorporate those lessons into our own independent identity.

The film’s ultimate destination proves rewarding and undeniably affecting in what might come to be remembered as Australia’s other road movie of 2009 (the other being Samson & Delilah). There are moments of profound beauty to be found in Last Ride, which may not quite reach true greatness, but is an Australian film that sets the bar far higher than most. At various turns powerful, endearing, disturbing and compassionate, Ivin’s debut feature is an impressive balancing act to be sure and a journey well worth taking.

Last Ride screens as part of the Sydney Film Festival, 7 June and is released nationally 2 July.

Film review: Angels & Demons

2009-05-20T15:00:00.002+10:00

Director: Ron Howard
Cast: Tom Hanks, Ayelet Zurer, Ewan McGregor
Country: USA

"The antimatter is suspended, there, in an airtight nano-composite shell with electromagnets on each end. But if it were to fall out of suspension, and come into contact with matter, say with the bottom of the canister, the two opposing forces would annihilate one another. Violently." – Vittoria Vetra (I know this is a long quote but it really does sum things up).

Blink and you might miss all the historical intrigue acting as little more than script decoration in Da Vinci Code-follow up Angels & Demons. Ron Howard takes another swing at directing Dan Brown out of the dreary convolutions of his first attempt, ramping up the action and explosion alike, succeeding for the most part if you can ignore all the codswallop.

Plenty are easily suckered when it comes to conspiracy thrillers and puzzle adventures and so it is I find myself tricked by all the lavish art history sets, Italian accents, Vatican intrigue, secret societies, even secreter passageways and a theatrical Hans Zimmer score. Throw it all into a game of Pictionary meets 24 where Tom Hanks is teamed up with a beautiful not-Audrey Tautou European sidekick Ayelet Zurer, both racing to prevent the four frontrunners for the newly vacated Pope job being executed B-horror style every hour and an antimatter explosion at the stroke of midnight and, well, it’s all a bit breathless. For the first 100 minutes at least until the fidgeting, clock-watching and multiple endings start.

Once flying through streets of Rome in black cop cars has worn thin the script – built entirely around smart people explaining stuff real fast, juris-my-diction crap, and regular intervals of pontificating on Science and Religion – proves almost as turgid as the first time out. Solving clues to the implausible crimes at play by apparently a sole and devilishly bland evil assassin type (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) just a minute too late gets boring, as do the incessant twists. Is it Ewan McGregor’s earnest deputy Pope who dunnit? What about the moustache-twiddling cardinal played by Armin Mueller-Stahl? Or maybe it was that mean-spirited Swiss Guard chief Stellan Skarsgard?

‘Who cares’ screams Howard as he dazzles with yet another sweeping, melodramatic shot over St. Peter’s Square at night, ‘it’s much more exciting than the last one’! And like all joyrides this one goes on too long, spluttering to a finish after one final grand act of gratuitous absurdity. Don’t let all the smarty-pants, ancient name-dropping dupe you; this one is as dumb as they come.

Angels & Demons is on wide-release now

Film review: Gomorrah

2009-05-20T14:50:00.004+10:00

Director: Matteo Garrone
Cast: Salvatore Abruzzese, Gianfelice Imparato, Toni Servillo
Country: Italy

Carnage and terror are as pervasive as the claustrophobia and mundane bleakness that consumes life in Gomorrah. Violence doesn’t so much as invade its characters lives as it frames them amidst the totality of corruption and exploitation of the Camorra crime syndicate within a small community in Naples. Rarely has the gang world be so unromantised, so grimy, so deadly.

Director Matteo Garrone’s stunning assault on the senses comes to fiction by way of fact thanks Roberto Saviano’s expose of the Camorra’s workings (said to include some 4,000 murders during a 30 year span) that has seen the journalist-come-novelist who is now under 24-hour protective custody. Garrone weaves five narratives amidst the crumbling, decaying tenement buildings together: one involves a local tailor who crafts designer knockoffs, 13-year-old Totò who cannot escape entanglement, hapless idiots Marco and Ciro who idolise Tony Montana and run amok with inevitable results, money-man Don Ciro who drops payoffs to kept families behind enemy lines, and a corrupt business man literally poisoning the community with his illegal toxic dumping.

There is an uneasy stillness hanging permanently in the atmosphere of Gomorrah that plays like paranoid anxiety in a place where violence erupts without warning. It is not a face but rather the cold indiscrimination of a 9mm projectile that signals betrayal has come to visit or your past has caught up on you. And when the curtain draws unceremoniously on Gomorrah as it does the lives of its protagonists, you cannot escape the touch of its vortex of despair.

This review first appeared in 3D World.

Film review: Tenderness

2009-05-20T14:37:00.000+10:00

Dir: John Polson
Cast: Jon Foster, Russell Crowe, Sophie Traub
Country: USA

"He's addicted to the intimacy of the kill" – Detective Cristofuoro

Hack! Yeah, you heard right. John Polson: friend to the stars, creator of Tropfest, local boy come good, narcissist and cinematic hack. If you want to pick a fight allow me to point to exhibit A: Swimfan (2002), a tedious, melodramatic and derivative thriller devoid of originality. Or exhibit B: Hide And Seek (2005), an abysmal film that Polson should be ashamed to have allowed De Niro near, also devoid of originality. And now exhibit C: Tenderness, a dreary, offensively earnest faux indie flick so preoccupied with its own smug self-satisfied direction that it might be worth waterboarding Polson till he promises never to step behind the camera again.

Russell Crowe drifts through his role as a retired cop convinced that Eric (Jon Foster), the teenager he sent to juvenile detention for the brutal murder of his parents, will kill again as he is released on his eighteenth birthday. Crowe isn’t the only one stalking Eric as he finds himself the equally unhealthy focus of 16-year old Lori (Sophie Traub), who passes for a groupie with a death wish. Jon and Lori take to the road together pursued by Crowe who borders on the catatonic along with Foster, as they each crash through the wall of various telegraphed and deeply meaningful metaphors.

It’s hard to imagine Tenderness speaking to anyone, so morbid, tiresome and pointless the whole nonsensical exercise proves. If only California’s three strikes rule applied to cinema certain filmmakers might at least think twice before serving up such turgid fare. I’m looking at you Mr Polson.

This review first appeared in 3D World.

Film review: Synecdoche, New York

2009-05-20T14:32:00.004+10:00

Director: Charlie Kaufman
Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams
Country: USA

"We're all hurtling towards death, yet here we are for the moment, alive. Each of us knowing we're going to die, each of us secretly believing we won't" – Caden Cotard.

Synecdoche, New York might be the most disquieting and unnerving trips you take to the cinema this year. Once the dust has settled and fog cleared, see it again; watch screenwriter maestro Charlie Kaufman at work in all his baffling genius not because his story is hard to understand but because it is challenging in all the right ways. It is a film not simply about generic thematic spectres of creativity, desire and death but about our own mortality and our own paralysing insecurity. Kaufman looks deep inside himself, projects, and taps into subconscious.

Time as force of pounding inevitability is all-pervasive in Synecdoche. Our latest Kaufman onscreen manifestation, theatre director Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman so consistently brilliant its practically trite to mention), is a man obsessed with himself and his own imminent departure from the play of life. He casts 20somethings in Death Of A Salesman and time in his world passes with dizzying unease; blink and a month goes by, fall asleep and awake to find your waistline four inches wider and your hairline thinner in equal measure.

Ignoring for a moment elements like the sudden departure of Caden’s wife and child from his life, his hallucinations and girlfriends with homes perpetually on fire, the singular most stunning narrative device is the play about “everything.” Taking the $50,000 ‘genius grant’ he is awarded Caden’s rents a massive warehouse in New York and sets about telling his story about the world around him and, you know, Everything. And so it evolves into a play with a play within a life within a film, actors playing actors playing, well, you get the gist.

Poignancy hangs as thick as smoke billowing from an inferno and Kaufman explores as anarchy reigns within Caden’s make belief world while time marches on, blindly reaching for answers. “There are nearly thirteen million people in the world. None of those people is an extra. They're all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due,” says Caden. Synecdoche, New York is a witty, messy and utterly narcissistic movie, but my God is it an ambitious one – and one that will be deeply admired and appreciated for years to come.

This review first appeared in 3D World
Synecdoche, New York is still playing in selected Cinemas around Australia.

Peter Pan complex (Elegy)

2009-04-30T17:51:00.003+10:00

So I realise I never did point anyone to my review of Elegy written for 3D World. You can check it out by clicking here. I liked it, if in a muted sense because of the film's obvious emotional manipulations. Certainly the most interesting element – aside a strong, though unchallenging, performance from Penelope Cruz – is as another example of Sir Ben Kingsley's recent exploration of character's with a Peter Pan complex. Tristan Burke wrote a great review of The Wackness which you can read here and I'm certainly curious to see whether Kingsley continues to explore this subject matter of white male identity crisis.

Elegy is still screening at the Dendy cinema in Newtown

Looking for Shit to do?

2009-04-30T12:29:00.008+10:00

April really has been a pretty poor month for film in Australia. Things started off bad with Pink Panther 2, got flabby round the mid-section with Race To Witch Mountain and Fast & Furious (I know I gave it a positive review but please), with the final slices of shit pie coming in the form of Tenderness and Defiance (both released this Friday 30 April). I've already offered my 1,700 cents on X-Men Origins Wolverine so I won't retread this already well-covered tectonic ground.

There was some welcome reprieve thanks to middling efforts thanks to Good, Elegy and two very decent films with tricky titles to write together in a sentence: Mary And Max and Wendy And Lucy. But nothing really got me going this month, and as such I must confess to have taken to catching up on some television I'd missed including the interesting Generation Kill, the disappointing seasons 3 and 4 of Weeds and finally my new favourite piece of quality drama Mad Men.

Whilst there may not be an abundance of releases, May is shaping up to be much more promising with several quality films worth you hard-earned bucks. I'm not going to get into those right now, but I did want to point you in the direction of a very special events hosted by Popcorn Taxi. Monday 11 May there will be an extremely rare theatrical screening of micro-budget Aussie drug dramedy Pure Shit, which was banned on its initial release in 1975. Andrew McKay of the Melbourne Herald dubbed Pure Shit “The most evil film ever made,” which may sound alarmist to some while the more twisted of us wring our hands in delight. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Bert Deling and various cast members and I highly recommend you check out the event page for more information an to book your tickets.

If you need more convincing take a read of Stephen Groenewegen's review at eFilmCritic.

It should be a busy week for the folks at Popcorn Taxi who are also hosting a screening of the much touted RiP: A Remix Manifesto followed by a Q&A with director Brett Gaylor (Wednesday 13 May). The film was a big hit at this year's SXSW so I'm really looking forward to this one. I'm hoping to interview Brett for 3D World... watch this space.

Film review: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

2009-04-28T02:44:00.022+10:00

Director: Gavin Hood
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston
Country: USA

“I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do isn’t very nice.” – Wolverine

The Wolverine of the X-Men Origins isn’t exactly the charismatically cantankerous anti-hero that always made the character so popular. He’s still a pretty tough bastard and can offer up feral snarls when the occasion demands, but he’s a generally bit more of a pussycat here, equipped with wisecracks that veer much closer to 80s action kiss offs when he's not crying and dashes of farce that reek of lazy comedy. But this isn’t Gavin Hood’s biggest problem; the very nature of this prequel means an end to the mystery of this enigmatic character’s history, and it’s for this reason in part that Wolverine is ultimately a largely underwhelming film.

Whatever ways Wolverine’s backstory has been told before I’m told it’s never been particularly satisfying, how could it though? Like the smoke monster in Lost, the less I see the more I’m fascinated. And so in that sense this movie was always going to be a big ask unless it was really nailed it in terms of character, but in the absence of that kind of depth the only other direction to go in is the big budget action flick route which Hood has blithely pursued with the watchful eyes of Fox peering over his shoulder and no doubt second guessing the film’s direction at every stage of production.

We know that it’s possible to make a great comic book movie that focuses on a single compelling character, just see The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan), Spider-man 2 (Sam Raimi) and I would add Unbreakable (M. Night Shyamalan) into that mix. But instead of taking a few leafs out of the pages of these films, Hood and the screenwriters David Benioff and Skip Woods (brought on to revise the script) merely copied their playbook from the existing X-Men movies and Heroes when this should have been a much more personal film. Instead they’ve gone Epic, rammed as many Colourful Characters into the 107-minute runtime as possible and diluted any moments of interesting personal development by punctuating them with some sort of explosion. It doesn’t take long to realise that this film is about as deep as a your average hipster.

There are many things to say about this, let's begin with the fact that clearly David Benioff is not cut out for writing action movies, first Troy and now Wolverine. Look the writing here is not terrible, but it is frequently poor, filled with exposition and clunky one-liners. That for a start just lowers the tone of everything to the point at which it felt like I was watching melodrama with family intrigue, revenge plots and a puke-inducing love story that wasn’t remotely believable. There’s a moment where were learn where Wolverine picked up his name from and I realised I was daydreaming about something completely different so meandering is the dialogue in the scene.

What’s disappointing about this is that Benioff can really write. I’m a big fan of 25th Hour (Spike Lee, 2002), which I’d recommend to anyone, and The Kite Runner was another excellent adaptation. Both films are small, personal dramas and I can’t understand why Benioff hasn’t or hasn’t been allowed to bring these sorts of credentials to Wolverine, it would surely have been suited to the concept of an intense character study. From Skip Woods, the man behind Hitman and Swordfish this is a far less surprising outcome. I would be very curious to see what kind of stages of development this film has undergone, where the cuts have been made and if it’s been dumbed down along the way.

So what have we got? Well, we meet young Logan/Wolverine and his brother (possibly half brother, it’s not exactly clear) Victor Creed/Sabretooth and the two flee home together after Logan murders a man with his newly discovered claws. This is the year 1845 and over the film’s credit sequence we see the two brothers fighting together in the Civil War, the trenches of World War I, on the beach of Normandy, and in Vietnam. Sabretooth shares similar powers of healing to Wolverine and so the two pretty much run amok in what is a highly stylised but erudite piece of storytelling where we see Wolverine’s distaste for killing and his brother’s growing addiction to carnage.

Their unique talents are discovered by William Stryker (Danny Huston) who recruits the pair into his mutant dirty dozen, complete with: Dominic Monaghan doing his best Matt Parkman; some guy called Zero who has escaped from Equilibrium; Ryan Reynold’s Deadpool aka, same schtick as Blade Trinity minus the beard; Will.i.am (as John Wraith) channeling Jesse Ventura’s Blain from Predator but with teleportation skills, and finally Kevin Durand (as The Blob) who’ll later be a fat joke stolen from Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. And we still haven’t met Logan’s girlfriend or Gambit yet who each get a few minutes to take the limelight away from our main man.

Wolverine eventually abandons the mutant gang and his brother in pursuit of the quiet life making an honest living as a logger, chewing his cigars, sleeping in a wood cabin with his girl Kayla (Lynn Collins) and having nightmares about the wars. He can’t escape his past though and is soon tracked down by Stryker with news that someone’s killing his old crew and that he should probably think about getting his bones bonded with adamantium – the rest as they say is history.

While the action comes at regular intervals picking up the audience from the get go and briskly dashing through the narrative, the only set piece that wowed was a pretty thrilling takedown of a room filled with semi-automatics by Deadpool. Otherwise I really found the action sequences poorly devised on the whole, lacking a spacial awareness that left the editing feeling frantic to the point of confusion. Many of the fights reminded me of the opening chase in Quantum Of Solace, which boils down to a lack of experience and a non-instinctive eye for action.

Then there were the special effects, which for a movie that will have cost in excess of $100 million were a big disappointment. Within confined spaces of studio stunt work the production values were excellent and the fight involving the woefully underused Gambit (Taylor Kitsch not quite nailing the Cajun accent, perhaps they should’ve gone with Josh Holloway) looks great. Any fights between Wolverine and Sabretooth have an anti-climatic feel, mostly just the same two big blokes stabbing each other with their claws and spouting sibling rivalry taunts. No, it’s when the actions gets out in the open and requires some green screen work that the effects fall apart. In fact it’s odd because I can’t remember seeing another big budget film that looked so poor since maybe the kite surfing of glacial tidal waves incident in Die Another Day.

By the final act the movie has gotten somewhat tiresome as yet another a fight between guys who are all invincible so long as they can keep their heads as Deadpool returns as the film's end of level baddie. It barely warrants much talking about at this stage because it’s all the same problems repeated, poor action editing, sub-par effects and character’s who haven’t been drawn out in any meaningful way. And I should also add that the constant score throughout the entire film (it felt at least) was the most gnawingly annoying soundtrack I’ve heard in a while with every note telling me how I should feel, think and react at any given moment. Totally over the top and unnecessary.

Jackman is the cog in this malfunctioning machine of a movie that just barely holds it all together. When he’s having fun as Wolverine, you’re having fun watching him – it’s just a shame he’s given no meat to work with here. But this is the Wolverine movie they chose to make and in a sense it is successful in being a largely vacuous popcorn comic book blockbuster that not going to set the world alight, but keep this franchise ticking over and the dollars rolling in. What it does do is demonstrate the complete lack of ambition or imagination currently at work in the Fox production rooms. Whatever you say about Watchmen you can’t argue with how utterly daring Warner Bros was with such a valued property. Then here we have Wolverine, easily the most fascinating character of the Marvel universe wasted by turning his origin story into a Die Hard In A Comic Book Movie, complete with white singlet.

If you’ve ever watched J.J. Abrams' talk at TED about the magic box then let me just say that this is exactly what he was talking about. Wolverine is a fascinating character precisely because his history is a mystery. Feed us bits here and there sure, but I just don’t think stripping the character down like this serves any purpose. And to be honest in the process the filmmakers have criminally failed to explore his character in the lead up to his amnesia in any thought-provoking or insightful way. One minute he’s a child, the next he’s a fully formed adult with his principles and beliefs already in place, and quite frankly he’s a goody-two shoes. Instead of the Who, we got the What, Where and When. The Why should be important, but it is reduced to little more than a plot device.

Wolverine is a decent enough film, it’s certainly not a bad one and is much better than the abomination that was X3: The Last Stand. But I can’t bring myself to recommend it to you because films should be better than this and they should aspire to more, especially ones that carry the precious cargo that is character rarities like Wolverine. Sure he’s cool and tough enough to carry a mindless action movie like this one, but he’s also smart and complex enough to warrant a closer look at what really lies beneath that adamantium shell.

Scott Henderson

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is released in cinemas 30 April

Film review: I Love You, Man

2009-04-21T09:47:00.005+10:00

Cast: Paul Rudd, Jason Segel, Rashida Jones,
Director: John Hamburg
Country: USA

"I've been trying to meet someone" – Peter Klaven

There’s a word that rhymes with flick that ought to be substituted with chick when referring to the new breed of so-called ‘bromance’. Unfortunately despite a certain charm that matches the intellectual age of most men no one is going to adopt it due to the easily misconstrued nature of unsaid phrase. Course in the age of the metrosexual such crudities don’t always fly, but as we discover in I Love You, Man that doesn’t necessarily mean modern metroman and Neanderthal man aren’t compatible.

Handed the leading man keys is Paul Rudd along with Forgetting Sarah Marshall’s comedy revelation Jason Segel for what is essentially a wafer thin a spin on the old boy meets girl formula. In director John Hamburg’s world the boy already won the girl and is getting set to marry her, the trick is he doesn’t have a best man to complete the wedding day package. Cue pretty hilarious story of boy meets boy, boy loses boy… well, you get the picture.

Peter Klaven (Rudd) has always been more into girlfriends according to his more macho gay brother (played by Andy Samberg) who offers an odd contrast to Rudd’s camped up nice guy estate agent. There’s no reason given for this, but we accept it in the face of convention and perhaps see some commentary on the status of 21st Century American manhood where guys don’t belong to bowling teams anymore and are more likely be found sat on the couch with their better half eating ice cream and watching Atonement.

After setting out to find the ‘perfect best man’ during which we get the predictable faux pas’ involving cases of mistaken sexuality and ‘worst man date ever’ scenarios Peter meets Sydney Fife and it is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Sydney leads a bloke’s dream life with his dog in Venice Beach where his home includes a ‘man cave’, complete with full band rig, videogames, a bar, various memorabilia and a jerk off station. Sydney and Peter bond over their shared love of Rush and generally embark on a whirlwind bromantic affair that inevitable causes conflict at home for the groom to be.

With a gimmick this tenuous it takes two extremely talented and compelling leads to bring home the funny. With Rudd and Segel effortlessly riffing off each other so well that the script’s flimsier jokes and overplayed ones rarely eliciting much in the way of groans, I Love You, Man is better than any film of this sort has any right to be.

It’s a shame then that Hamburg fails to really nail the film’s more ‘traditional’ relationship between Peter and girlfriend Zooey, who is the film’s most short-changed character giving the talented Rashida Jones little to work with. It might be endearing to a fault and the film could do with loosing 15-minutes, but it would take a deeply cynical critic not to enjoy I Love You, Man.

I Love You, Man is released in Australia 23 April
This review also appears in 3D World magazine

Film review: Fast And Furious

2009-04-20T08:52:00.003+10:00

Cast: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Jordana Brewster
Director: Justin Lin
Country: USA

"Tell me it wasn't a mistake reinstating you" – FBI Boss

If you are even remotely taking seriously the fourth outing of a franchise that is essentially a petrol-fuelled bromance vehicle for himbo Paul Walker and his gimpy mate Vin Diesel then Fast & Furious is not the film you’re looking for. If you have delusions that the first movie was anything more than a b-movie bonanza walk away now. But if you’re happy watching these two lugs spouting joyously bad dialogue amidst a flurry of beautiful babes and colourful cars then be prepared to strap in and disengage your brain.

It’s been eight years since the whole gang originally starred together in surprise hit The Fast And The Furious. The interim saw a horrible follow-up starring Walker while Diesel priced himself out of the film went off to try his luck with xXx, Chronicles Of Riddick and, er, The Pacifier before returning to the series for a cameo for threequel Tokyo Drift.

Walker didn’t exactly fair much better with a blink-and-you’d-miss-it part in Flags Of Our Fathers followed by a starring role in Disney dog drama Eight Below. And we shouldn’t forget also-rans Jordana Brewster and Michelle Rodriguez, not that screenwriter Chris Morgan has paid them much more than lip service here.

Directed by Justin Lin, who gets another shot after shooting the Tokyo-leg, there’s a certain meathead charm about F&F. This one is a revenge story incorporating drug running across the US-Mexico border through a labyrinthine tunnel network to be negotiated at breakneck speeds in fast cars driven by faster drivers – namely Diesel’s Dom Toretto, Walker’s FBI agent Brian O’Connor and some Clubber Lang meets Once Were Warriors-type bad guy called Phoenix. Oh, and there’s an obligatory street racing scene for good measure.

The movie promises much in the way of action credentials from the opening gas tanker heist as featured in the trailer that is inventive if somewhat nonsensical (much like the tunnel that exists firmly outside of reason). Later chases lose their edge thanks to the heavy incorporation of CGI flying in the face of the kind of realism brought to the screen by Death Proof’s much more impressive musclecar thrill ride. What F&F lacks in the way of grit it more than makes up for with sheer narcissism and earnestness without a trace of irony in sight.

But what were you expecting? F&F does everything you’d expect from a film that effortlessly spews lines like “Maybe you’re the bad guy pretending to be the good guy,” and “I thought we signed on to do the right thing.” Big, dumb and bold as brass: much like old Vin himself.

Whether or not this will be the shot in the arm the leads’ careers could use remains to be seen, though it’s hard to imagine it’ll be anything other than a case of rinse and repeat.

Scott Henderson

Fast & Furious is in cinemas now
This review also appears in 3D World

Mystery man: J.J. Abrams

2009-04-10T18:49:00.006+10:00

J.J. Abrams is an allusive chap it must be said. I tried to get the Star Trek director on the record about his next project and he managed to mostly avoid my question twice by with a cheeky bit of vagueness. He did say that he would like to direct a script that he himself is writing but I couldn't get him to say what it was. I did manage him to talk about Lost and the fact that he would love to make a return in the final season.

After the bump you can read the extract from my interview on Abrams' plans for the future...

What your doing next always seems to have something of an air of mystery about it, there is the untitled Hunter Scott project, producing an earthquake movie, Mystery On Fifth Avenue, The Dark Tower and Cloverfield 2. Can you enlighten us on your next project and what is currently closest to your heart?

I’m playing around with an idea that hopefully will take root, and in the meantime we have a movie that we start shooting next month that we are producing with Harrison Ford and Rachel McAdams, Morning Glory (directed by Roger Michell), which is a comedy written by the woman who wrote The Devil Wears Prada.

What about directing and writing for yourself?

I’m working on a script right now again, hopefully it’ll happen. If it does then that’d be something I’d like to direct.

Is there any possibility that you will return to Lost before the show ends? Is that something that you’d like to do?

My guess is not. I would love to do it, but given the things I’m working on, and the fact is they have formed this family and Jack Bender who is the director/producer, he’s got to direct the finale, he has too. If there is time it would be a wonderful thing to come back. I miss those people and so many of them are new, since I was there working on the show the cast has grown enormously and there’s this whole other amazing group of actors there. I remain amazed at the work Damon, Carlton, Jack and the other do. Every time someone’s like ‘man, I loved last night’s Lost’ I’m like I’ll tell Damon, I’m so thrilled. It’s all about what those guys do.

It’s just the gift that keeps giving back…

It really is that I’m telling you. Makes me feel guilty.

Film review: Mary And Max

2009-04-10T11:25:00.004+10:00

Director: Adam Elliot
Cast: Toni Collette, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Eric Bana, Barry Humphries
Country: Australia

"Sometimes those who find the world quite impossible, find each other" – Narrator

There is a joy to be had in watching Mary And Max, a bizarre black comedy about two penfriends who are loners in a world that is frequently cruel to them. To call it a black comedy probably does the film a disservice because this Australian film might just be one of the more charming dramadies of the year. Mary And Max also just so happens to come in the form of that animated rarity, claymation.

Painstakingly filmed using stop-motion, captured at four seconds a day for just over a year, it is with a sense of visual wonder that one experiences director Adam Elliot's creation. Sure part of the joy lies in watching this world brought to life as if touched by some sorcerer’s apprentice, but mostly it comes from a wonderful realisation of the human spirit as indomitable and affectionate portrayal of a relationship that is true as any real action pairing.

Elliot’s last outing was the 2003 Oscar-winning animated short Harvey Krumpet, an odd tale about a man with Tourettes Syndrome and chronic bad luck, a pattern that can be traced throughout the filmmaker's work. It should come as no surprise then that his first feature would be a biography of two social outcasts who form the unlikeliest of friendships.

In the small Australian town of Waverley bullied eight-year old schoolgirl Mary Daisy Dinkle spontaneously pulls a page from a New York telephone directory and randomly selects one Max Jerry Horovitz to be the recipient of a letter. Max, a 44-year old Jewish man with Asperger’s Syndrome overcomes his initial bewilderment and writes back to Mary; as fate would have it the two are kindred spirits.

Whilst Mary is a delight of a character wonderfully voiced as a child by Bethany Whitmore and Toni Collette as an adult, it is Max who steals the show. Beneath the surface of the script filled with undeniable charm, oddball wit and whimsical humour is a character so fully brought to life by Philip Seymour Hoffman that he inspires such pathos to make this film endlessly enriching.

The story, accompanied by long and occasionally overcooked passages of Barry Humphries suitably gravely narration, meanders at times and it may be a little too despairing or maudlin in flavour for some. But Elliot spoils us not only with a keen cinematic experience, but an astute emotional one too. It is not a stretch to declare Mary And Max the best Australian feature film of the year to date.

Mary and Max opens 9 April.
This review also appears in 3D World

Review: the World Premiere that wasn't (Star Trek XI)

2009-04-08T15:49:00.024+10:00

Well that was a random 24 hours that just took place in the world of Star Trek, Paramount, Austin, Sydney, and me. Yesterday morning I headed down to Sydney’s Intercontinental Hotel for the Star Trek XI junket hosted by Paramount Australia, in town was director J.J. Abrams, Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Karl Urban, John Cho and, of course, Eric Bana. Bana was the only cast member I didn’t request an interview with mainly because he’d just done so much press for Love The Beast I wasn’t too fussed and was more focussed on getting time with Abrams. All my interviews went really well, Abrams was lovely and I got extra time with him thanks to those nice people at Paramount and the sheer amount of articles I’m writing on the film. But during my interview with Pine and Quinto something quite bizarre happened, something I’ve certainly never experienced before in the middle of an interview.

So there I am chatting away with the new Captain Kirk and Spock when Bryan Burk (producer) and a couple of random guys from the studio come in and sorta hijack my interview with news of a “standing O” in Austin. Everyone in the room is smiling cheek-to-cheek, slapping high-fives and hugging, the room is completely abuzz and I’m wondering what the hell is happening to my interview. Bryan Burk introduces himself to me and explains that they just premiered the new Star Trek movie at a surprise screening in Austin at the Alamo Drafthouse (my beloved former local cinema), introduced by Leonard Nimoy, writers Orcia and Kurtzman and producer David Lindelof, and that it had been received with a spontaneous standing ovation. It’s awesome, I mean all-time outrageously awesome. Knowing the Drafthouse this is the exact kind of stunt I came to know and love from Tim League and the team there – though perhaps the coolest thing in this instance was that not even the town’s famous cinephile had any knowledge of the con going in to the screening (thinking instead they had programmed a screening of Wrath Of Kahn).

Once the moment had settled it occurred to me: ‘well I suppose that is technically the world premiere of Star Trek then’, sure enough seeing the introductions on Youtube from Nimoy and co calling it that and reports on the net from Wired to the New York Times doing the same. But what of the hugely lavish event at the Sydney Opera House? It was effectively ‘reduced’ to Awesome Red Carpet Australian Premiere of the film, which you better believe we should count our lucky stars to have been treated to. But it’s not the world premiere: that honour belongs to those lucky audiences members in Austin. I’ve been accused of being “astonishing negative” in this regard already, but when history looks back, it will be the surprise screening in Austin people will talk about, hence none of the international press I’ve read have so far covered the event in Sydney. Really I think it is a bit of a shame for Paramount Australia because the Opera House screening was nothing short of spectacular. Perhaps they don’t care, perhaps they knew what was happening all along, but considering what happened next I suspect not.

Hearing news of the Austin screening I knew that Aint It Cool News’ Harry Knowles would be in the house (accompanied by Quint as it would turn out), also most likely Film School Rejects’ Neil Miller and any number of other websites/bloggers. I kinda suspected that because of the nature of the screening no-one would have been asked to sign embargos that all the media in Australia had (21 April), myself included, and no doubt elsewhere internationally. Sure enough, upon getting home reviews of the new Star Trek movie were here, there and everywhere, they were of course uniformly gushing – hardly surprising giving the events of the evening and the likely audience of hardcore Trekkies. Opening my email this morning, heading off my objections at the pass was an email from head of publicity for Paramount in Australia stating: “Overnight, a review has been published in the US, without our prior knowledge. Given this, we have argued that it would be unfair to hold Australian media to the embargo. We have been advised that the review embargo has now been lifted.”

Having already had fingers pointed at me about my issues with this on Twitter I think it’s necessary to reiterate that the Opera House event was stunning, I went there with tickets given to me by my editor (I wasn’t actually invited personally I’m sorry to say), and it was my first time at Sydney’s world famous venue. However, I must confess that knowing it had already screened in Austin took a little magic out of the event for me. I’m a complete romantic at heart, one though with a strong streak of cynicism. Maybe I’m missing the point, but for me the world premiere – which is the first time a film screens publicly – took place in Austin. And in a way it does bother me that tickets were sold to people for the world premiere in Australia at $100 a pop and that people flew around the world to see it under that impression. Cynical indeed, but perhaps not as cynical as being in the Opera House having the film introduced as the world premiere after it screened to a public audience five hours earlier, which (call me a spoil-sport) is misleading at best and false advertising at worst.

Now, once again, let me say that I love that Paramount did this and I’m jealous like crazy I wasn’t there – though that is as much my heart yearning to move back to Austin as it is my opinions on the semantics of what makes a ‘world premiere’. Don’t know how much flak I’ll catch for this, but I suppose after so much hard work I kinda feel like Paramount Australia got the carpet pulled out from under them, whether or not it’s something they give a damn about having had all the talent over to start their world tour and a massively expensive red carpet affair at the Opera House.

To say a little more on the Opera House experience itself: there was an almost ethereal quality to seeing Star Trek in this most iconic of performing arts venue. First of all the shell roof evokes the Starfleet insignia which is a wonderful coincidence only enhanced by the projected lights everywhere of famous symbol. Having walked more than my fair share of red carpet in London’s Leicester Square I can confirm that the Opera House wins on length, width and steps. All of which added to the epic feel of the experience. Inside the reception hall glass windows frame the view of the Harbour Bridge, perhaps the visual cousin of the Golden Gate Bridge as featured in Star Trek by Starfleet HQ (which I think is so appropriately located in San Francisco, I mean of course it is at the centre of the high-tech corridor and American liberalism – though Star Trek is less liberal than it may seem, and more a example of liberal-imperialism), and night cityscape of Sydney and the habour itself which certainly inspires in its combination of the majesty of human technological ingenuity and the beauty of the natural world. Inside those wonderful expressionist corridors are vast concrete walls that look as though they belong in the Vulcan high council chambers, lacking only great statuettes of legends passed.

Okay, I kinda feel like I’m digressing badly into stuff no-one wants to read especially as I don’t have pictures. Allow me to lastly say this of the Concert Hall, getting the acoustics right took an unbelievable amount of work and boy did those guys succeed. From where I was sat in the lower hall, just below the cast and studio folks, the sounds of the movie was incredible (just remembered that I actually got swiped by a metal detector on the way in, which was new). Despite the huge ceiling and issues with echoing they have there the crew did a remarkable job of turning the Concert Hall into a movie theatre. The sound effects of explosions (yes, explosions in space) ripped through my body, phasers fizzled in my ears, and submarine pings echoed in my mind. Perhaps the biggest thrill though was hearing Michael Giacchino wonderful score, occasionally riffing off the original series music, boom out its epic orchestral tones inside this traditional musical coliseum.

And then there was the movie. Let me first say, depending on time allowance, this may or may not be my final review. I would like to offer you a few reactions having seen the film twice now, but considering this post cover the Opera House premiere it’s a time sensitive situation.

J.J. Abrams has broken the curse of the odd-numbered Star Trek movies and in the process made a film that I think ranks up there with First Contact as the next best Trek movie after Wrath Of Kahn. As a reboot it succeeds in arguably all it’s goals whilst never losing grasp of what made the series so beloved by so many over several generations. And as a piece of entertainment Abrams has delivered a movie that is every bit the popcorn, joyride spectacular demanded by audiences to achieve true blockbuster status.

From the moment we see the opening salvo involving the USS Kelvin and a massive rogue Romulan mining ship with a captain hell bend on revenge, Trek kicks into the high gears going from space battles to bar brawls to atmospheric sky dives to transporter trickery with dizzying ease. Abrams has certainly reached for a ‘roidy, warp injection of a movie after the at times lacklustre, dreary and formulaic formality of much of the series and in the process he has almost entirely reset the clock on Star Trek mythology.

Remember those humous Star Trek: 90210 comments a couple of months back? Forget about them. Abrams greatest success is the one that could so easily have been his greatest failure. Against all the odds really the director has managed to assemble a young cast of icon stand ins almost uniformly filling the shoes of the original Kirk, Spock, Bones, Ohura, Chekov, Scotty and Sulu in what could easily have been called Star Trek: Origins. Firstly the not so convincing: John Cho never quite convinces as Sulu, but then he’s really not given very much material in order to establish a character who was always on the periphery. It might be that knowing this Orci and Kurtzman decided not to spend much time with the Trek universe’s sole Asian-American representative. That said, Cho gets to show off his action chops and Sulu’s fencing skills even if the production team seems to have mistaken a rapier for a samurai sword.

The second misfire for me is Simon Pegg as Scotty. Being a Scotsman myself, James Doohan was always my favourite character on the show (I’ll never forget him trying to talk to the computer then through the mouse in Voyage Home, hilarious) and it just felt as though of all the actors Pegg was the one trying too hard. The accent isn’t really on the money and in the early scenes he’s given some peculiar alien umpaa lumpaa as a comedy sidekick that just doesn’t work.

Walter Koenig’s Chekov was of course another favourite for sheer comedy value and Anton Yelchin has a lot of fun swapping his ‘v’s with his ‘w’s. He has that look of innocent awe that I remember from Koenig accompanied by great comic timing. The other supporting success comes from Zoe Saldana as Ohura, she is never anything less than convincing as a strong natural foil for Pine’s Kirk. I didn’t know much (anything?) about Saldana prior to this but I’ll certainly be looking out in future – Hollywood could certainly do with hiring more talented young African-American actress because off the top of my head I can’t think of a single one featuring prominently in a film this year or of any significant names from last year.

Finally there is the trifecta of Kirk, Spock and Bones, the hardest and most important roles to fill. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that all three are home runs, but I would be hard pressed to think of anyone better than messers Pine, Quinto and Urban. I think of all three it is Urban’s realisation of Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy that is the big winner here. From the moment McCoy sits down next to Kirk and threatens to puke on him as the disgruntled doctor expresses his dislike of technology before revealing his nickname's origin, Urban owns the cantankerous curmudgeon who would go on to be the third wheel in Kirk-Spock’s beautiful friendship.

Speaking of which, Pine and Quinto play off each other so well as Kirk and Spock in this changed universe. Pine is a youthful and damaged Kirk whose swagger veers closer to youthful arrogance and masochistic appetite to rebel. He is off course a Kirk whose father dies at the beginning of the movie as the Trek timeline is altered, robbing him of a guiding influence into Starfleet where he would famously pass the Kobayashi Maru test of the unwinnable situation. Pine’s Kirk retains the magnetic charisma of William Shatner whilst avoiding follies such as attempting to emulate his speech patterns. The physicality is there though and don’t doubt for a second the moment he slouches in that captains chair is anything less than a geek-thrill.

Quinto probably has the hardest job of all, not only attempting to take on Leonard Nimoy’s mantle, but doing so in a film which the great man appears as, well, Spock. Given Spock’s physical manner and logic-obsessed character it’s near impossible to completely avoid a high level of imitation in this role, but Quinto manages to convey those classic Spock traits whilst also inserting a real sense of conflict, of internal growing pains of a man who is has not yet come to terms with his human-vulcan lineage. Quinto does really solid work realising those little mannerisms and excellent job of sparring with Kirk.

Outside of the central cast the movies most underwhelming element is Eric Bana’s Nero who is never drawn out in a fashion that is discerning to a three-dimensional character. Some exposition explains his motivations for revenge, even though they’re not entirely logical and kind of extreme under the circumstances. The reasons for his anger are understandable, but his apportioning of blame not so much. He never really seems like a man on the edge of madness or someone who is ever close to Kirk’s equal (miles from the adversarial level of say Kahn or the Borg). Sure he’s got a massive, technologically advanced ship that is otherwise an outrageously formidable opponent – but is all brawn and no brain, a combination that’s never quite as satisfying. We know Kirk can take a beating, that he can brawl with the best of them, it’s when he uses his brilliant tactical instincts and creativity that we get excited. As such the film's climax is basically pretty muted, and in a way so is Kirk’ s elevation to captain – more the result of collective conspiring than divine destiny.

I hate that this reads entirely like a blogger review, but this really is a bit of an after thought on my post regarding the film’s premiere. I could go on to talk about the stunning CGI on display here (which is nothing short of jaw-dropping), or Abrams’ obsession with lens flare (which is constant), and his vision of the sci-fi future (which is truly aspirational), but I’ll save all that for something a little more formal as a review closer to the release date. Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and I really liked the red carpet premiere a lot, but my love remains with the Alamo Drafthouse. Congratulations on the Star Trek world premiere coup.

Star Trek is released worldwide 7 May, 2009

Film review: Wendy And Lucy

2009-04-03T14:55:00.002+11:00

Director: Kelly Reichardt
Cast: Michelle Williams, Walter Dalton, Will Patton
Country: USA

"I'm heading for Alaska, I hear they need people up there" Wendy

Filmed in August 2007 and making its debut at Cannes the following May, Wendy And Lucy has taken a long journey to get their story told. Yet this slice of life on the edge of society could hardly be more pertinent than it is today.

Director Kelly Reichardt replicates the subtle meditation of her last feature Old Joy (2006) and here combines it with something akin to the harsh reality of existence within the mundane and the disquieting amputation of margin for error. The result is a simple, elegant and affecting tale about a young girl who becomes stranded in a small Oregon town of the Northwest United States on her way to Alaska.

Michelle Williams plays the eponymous Wendy whilst Lucy is her canine companion, a gorgeous yellow mutt with more charisma in her few short scenes than most of 2009’s class of leading actors. Williams does some of her best ever work here as this delicate girl, with short brown hair and a pale complexion who manages to convey simultaneously a sense of browbeat stoicism and unflinching vulnerability.

With just 525 bucks left in her budget Wendy hits a streak of bad luck that snowballs as these things have a habit of doing when you think you’re at your lowest ebb. After her car breaks down, leaving her stranded in this tired washed-up town, one thing leading to another Wendy gets caught shoplifting dog food, arrested and loses Lucy. The young drifter finds herself contending not only with the loss of her companion but also the financial implications resulting from being arrested and the repairs to her crapped out Honda.

Reichardt explores small acts of kindness and the limits of generousity in her quiet disconnected observations of Wendy’s struggles. Like the local rent-a-cop who watches Wendy’s strife we witness from a distance as she searches everywhere for Lucy, following the dreariness of uncertainty and impending disaster that hangs over her precarious circumstance.

Even if you’ve never been in a situation where you find yourself holding onto to the best-case scenario despite knowing the worst is inevitable, you can imagine the fear that must grip Wendy’s fragile existence. Some will question how did she got herself into such a mess, others wonder what they would do in her shoes or if they would have helped her. These are the questions that Reichardt is dangles while Williams portrayal demands consideration.

At 80 minutes Wendy And Lucy is a snapshot, a perfectly balanced tale of a lost soul daydreaming their way to what is hoped a better place. The resolution is open-ended but you’d better believe this is a story that will reside meaningfully in your heart for a long time after.

Scott Henderson

This review first appeared in 3D World

Film review: The Uninvited

2009-03-27T14:05:00.004+11:00

Director: Charles and Thomas Guard
Cast: Emily Browning, Elizabeth Banks, David Strathairn
Country: USA

"I really hope this works out so you can stay." Rachael

The problem with these remakes of Asian horror films is that something is nearly always lost in translation. It might be a specific cultural idiosyncrasy, a stylistic flourish unique to the filmmaker, or something as simple as setting. The worst thing that could be lost in the transfer is soul, and this is the case for The Uninvited.

Directed by newcomers Thomas and Charles Guard, Hollywood’s take on Ji-woon Kim’s A Tale Of Two Sisters is all a bit paint by numbers. Emily Browning plays a young girl released from psychiatric care where she has spent the 10 months since a fire finished off her already terminally ill mother. Returning home to her father (David Strathairn) and sister Alex (Arielle Kebbel) Anna discovers that her mother’s carer Rachel (Elizabeth Banks) is a breath away from officially becoming her evil stepmom. On top of that poor Anna is haunted by eerie visions of a redheaded girl who insists Rachel is dangerous, though we suspect as much given the string score accompanying her sinister appearances.

The purpose of the ghost isn’t exactly clear though it’ll likely make you jump out your seat and spill your popcorn once or twice. More important to the film is the question of whether Rachel murdered Anna’s mother. The Uninvited is effective in these regards and the youthful Browning is suitably vulnerable and convincing to carry it all off. It’s a solid film that looks striking and ticks most of the right boxes for the genre without delivering anything particularly unique.

The Uninvited is released in Australia 27 March
This review also appears in 3D World

Film review: Bottle Shock

2009-03-27T13:48:00.007+11:00

Director: Randall Miller
Cast: Chris Pine, Bill Pullman, Alan Rickman
Country: USA

"You think I'm an ass. And I'm not really. It's just that I'm British and you're not." Steven Spurrier

If Bottle Shock was a variety of wine it would probably be Merlot. Now I don’t know much about wine per se, but I do know the cantankerous oenophile of Sideways wouldn’t be caught dead drinking it, and he seemed to know what he was talking about. The same might be said of Bottle Shock, an occasionally charming film that’s probably best consumed when all the good stuff’s already drunk.

In 1976, the year of the US bicentennial, a winery from California beat the Gaul’s at their own game in a blind tasting competition conducted by French judges. This is the basis for co-writer and director Randall Miller’s tale partly about a snooty Brit (Alan Rickman) who leaves his ailing wine merchants in Paris to taste the best Napa Valley has to offer, meeting along the way a struggling vintner (Bill Pullman) of Chateau Montelena and his son (Chris Pine). As this is one of those ensembles of colourful character-type narratives we meet all sorts of eccentrics and learn, you know, Yanks have culture too.

There’s a love story too between Pine (who plays a buffoon here), his poor ethnic buddy who works at Montelena (Freddie Rodriguez) and the vineyard intern (Rachael Taylor). No prizes for guessing who she ends up with, though that’s not the film’s worst faux pas.

Not one for the connoisseur’s, Bottle Shock is a little bit all over the place and ultimately unsatisfying. Taste test verdict: this one’s a bit corked.

Bottle Shock is released in Australia 27 March
This review also appears in 3D World

Classic Scene #5: "Can I buy you a drink?"

2009-03-20T16:14:00.007+11:00

Taking a 'time out' in Out Of Sight

Is there a more perfect courting/love scene in the history of cinema? Seriously, I can't think of one. After two bland movies (The Peacemaker and One Fine Day) and one disaster (Batman & Robin) Clooney landed the role of Jack Foley in Out Of Sight, the first of many he was 'born to play' but before he'd shaken off his tv doctor persona. When director Steven Soderbergh cast him opposite Jennifer Lopez (who herself was still a popstar playing actress) as Karen Sisko in this Elmore Leonard adaptation who could've know we were about to witness such a perfect storm of onscreen chemistry?

Lopez was elegant and energetic, full of sass and bristling sexuality. Clooney had an unassuming, charming cool about him and a streak of nervous playfulness. They shared just two moments of screen time together prior to this scene, the first a brilliant encounter in the trunk of the car where they speculate how unrealistic it was that Faye Dunaway and Robert Redford hook up so quickly in Three Days Of The Condor. The second was a frozen moment in the hotel elevator where Karen hesitates in arresting Jack, which he responds with a wave. Such connections reach beyond normal explanations Jack points out to Karen in the cocktail lounge where they meet:

"It's just something that happens. It's like seeing someone for the first time, like you could be passing in the street and you look at each other and for a few seconds there's a recognition, like you both know something. The next moment the person is gone and it's too late to do anything about it. And you always remember it because it was there and you let it go and you think to yourself what if I had stopped? What if I have said something. What if? What if? It may only happen a few times in your life."

KS: "Or once."

JF: "Or once..."

It's only then we notice David Holmes sensual score become prominent as Soderbergh begins to cut between the lounge and footage of their actual love scene. Moments overlap, glances are stolen and hands brush against body parts. They discuss their fantasy while acting it out, flirting with their words and their bodies – bittersweetness hangs throughout. Soderbergh keeps his camera unsteady, spying on them through the grainy lens as tiny freeze frames capture their dance. The scene is never gratuitous, refusing to revel in the flesh, eroticism purely by association. It is as close to perfection as it gets.

Star Trek world premiere at Sydney Opera House

2009-03-20T14:52:00.005+11:00

So some very excited news for my closet geek side, the world premiere of J.J. Abrams' Star Trek is going to take place here at Sydney's very own Opera House. Word is that J.J. Abrams and cast members Eric Bana, Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and Karl Urban will all be in attendance to introduce the film in the Concert Hall. The event is going to take place on 7 April and you better believe I'm getting ticket and interview requests in today. Big kudos to the team at Paramount Pictures Australia for this huge score.

It's not something I go about broadcasting but I definitely have a big soft spot for Star Trek and would love to see it get back up on its feet after the last couple of disappointing Next Gen efforts. As if I wasn't already hyped enough by the prospect of Abrams at the helm, the trailers have just looked spectacular so far, I really hope this one doesn't disappoint. Check out the latest trailer after the bump, it looks epic!

Weekend warriors

2009-03-19T21:18:00.013+11:00

It's Friday tomorrow so now is as good a time as any to get into the habit of posting a summary of the weekends movie releases and goings on. I'll be watching some movies no doubt, but for me the biggest thing that's going down is the series finale of Battlestar Galactica.

I was chatting on email with one of my editors who was telling me he'd finally decided that he'd like to check it out after reading this article over at The Guardian. My response was "Let me just tell you that I consider BSG as one of the pinnacles of intelligent television. It most certainly is right up there with The Wire for it's political enquiry and grit, on par with Lost for mystery, alongside 24 for action and in a league of its own for philosophical wondering." I'm find myself both nervous, excited and sad about this particular swansong probably even more so than I was with The Wire, mainly because I was late to that small screen party.

For those of you looking for something of the cinematic variety, these here are the films out this weekend in Australia. If you've got any suggestions for movie viewing of your own after the weekend why not leave a comment, someone will read it...

Blindness
Directed by Fernando City Of God Meirelles I've heard quite mixed things about this one. Could be an interesting movie conceptually, but as I understand it narratively it doesn't quite work.

Walter Chaw at Film Freak Central pretty much hated it - "Blindness reveals itself at the end as having nothing much to say beyond the Lord of the Flies truism that men left to their own devices are no better than animals."
Peter Bradshaw at The Guardian loved it - "I disagree with the detractors. For me, Meirelles, along with screenwriter Don McKellar and cinematographer Cesar Charlone, have created an elegant, gripping and visually outstanding film."

Duplicity
You can read my review, which hopefully doesn't come off as a rant against leading lady Julia Roberts who I thought was dreadful. Otherwise the movie a dose of fun if you don't get bored trying to keep up. Clive Owen is good value.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop
Can't say this one strikes me as very appealing though it sounds like fairly inoffensive visual comedy.

Roger Ebert appreciates its wholesome quality - "It's as slam-bang preposterous as any R-rated comedy you can name. It's just that Paul Blart and the film's other characters don't feel the need to use the f-word as the building block of every sentence."
Eric D. Snider of Cinematical thought it was ok - "And this is definitely for young and/or undiscerning viewers, a simple comedy, not unpleasant but not particularly funny, either."

Two Fists One Heart
This one caught me by surprise, a really solid Aussie sports drama that is visually lovely and tugs the old heart strings. Well worth checking out.

----------

Tomorrow I'm heading down to Dendy Opera Quays to check out a print of Casablanca which is playing as part of the Young At Heart film festival. I've never seen it on the big screen so I can't tell you how excited I am. Casablanca is one of the reasons I fell in love with cinema, that's entirely cliche but I don't care. I adore this movie. This 'quick' post I was putting together is actually a little longer than I expected it to be, so if you wanna check what else is playing as part of Young At Heart click here.

And finally I just saw the trailer for Sam Mendes new movie Away We Go, which looks fantastic. Mendes it seems has made a little American indie-esque road movie that fits the Focus Features mould perfectly.

Film review: Duplicity

2009-03-18T09:10:00.008+11:00

Director: Tony Gilroy
Cast: Clive Owen, Julia Roberts, Paul Giamatti, Tom Wilkinson
Country: USA

“If I told you I loved you would it make a difference” Claire Stenwick
“If you told me or if I believed you?” Ray Koval

Pitt/Jolie, Clooney/Lopez, Bogart/Bocall: now there’s a list of onscreen couples that sizzled in smart, sexy, sassy movies. Tony Gilroy gets half the equation right in his slick cinematic ride Duplicity: Clive Owen brings it all with a touch of class whilst Julia Roberts forgoes both the sex and sass, instead occupying the screen with little more than a smug grin.

Not that Gilroy doesn’t try his best to objectify America’s sweetheart, his first shot of the leading lady leering so far over her Brockovich chasm one fears the camera might disappear forever. In fact Gilroy spends much time of the time allowing his camera to obsess over Roberts’ physicality whether using those long legs as a means to identify her in a crowd, or trying to hypnotise the audience with her constant pouting, arm-folding and eyebrow raising.

If you’re tricked into thinking that passes for charisma more fool you, but then that’s what Duplicity is all about. If you can get passed the baggage Roberts’ brings to her leading role you’ll find a jaunty corporate espionage thriller that gets its kicks playing paranoia as pop-parody for screwball laughs.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s fun to be hand here and Gilroy relishes the opportunity, injecting a kinky sense of pizzazz to the whole affair. Witty repartees, confidence games and split screens all identify this as the smart-pants movie of the year. It’s a shame then that it all comes off as an awfully convoluted affair that jumps from one staged sequence to another, back and forth between the present and the past.

Gilroy moves the pieces around his board in a torrent of double-dealing and double-speak as two ex-spies turned star-crossed lovers, Claire Stenwick and Ray Koval, vie to out-dupe their respective companies, headed by rival CEOs Richard Garsik (Paul Giamatti) and Howard Tully (Tom Wilkinson). Giamatti is a constant source of scenery-chomping amusement while Wilkinson connives: one or both might get ripped off by the end of the movie but I’d love to see these two pair up as a sort of modern day Randolph and Mortimer.

The ins and outs of the plot don’t matter much, its all maguffins, smoke screens and slight of hand. Combined though with the dizzying pace of Gilroy’s script one wonders if the film wasn’t written with Mensa candidates as the target audience – course it’s mostly just a bunch of arm waving to throw us off scent. Snappy as it is at times, carried ably by a wry Owen throwing every bit of light-footed charm he’s got into the film, Duplicity just can’t sustain over two-hours of running around in circles like this. It all gets very tiresome once you realise the plot is in fact wafer thin and Roberts isn’t even particularly likeable.

As a sophmore outing Gilroy continues to show a great deal of promise, but as a director he has overindulged himself here and his choice of leading lady is an unfortunate by-product of that. Duplicity’s spunk appears entirely juxtaposed to an actress apparently with little left beyond her own tried, tested and tired persona to offer the acting fraternity.

A shame really, because all this needed to carry it over the finishing line was a real spark between the leads. Perhaps they should have gotten thrown into the trunk of a car together, dance the tango or smuggled people for La Résistance instead of concocting an elaborate con game and playing cute. The smartest, sexiest and sassiest films are usually the ones that don’t have to try so hard.

Scott Henderson

Duplicity is released in Australia 19 March, 2009

Film review: Two Fists One Heart

2009-03-17T16:06:00.008+11:00

Director: Shawn Seet
Cast: Daniel Amalm, Ennio Fantastichini, Jessica Marais, Rai Fazio
Country: Australia

“I treated you like my own son” – Joe Argo
“Come on Joe, you didn’t treat me that bad” – Nico

Real men don’t do weakness: they don’t talk about feelings, they don’t moisturise and they certainly don’t cry at movies. We know that the old adages die hard, and even as they are slowly worn away others remain along with the male ego; stubborn as an old mule, like father like son.

In Two Fists One Heart we meet Anthony Argo (Daniel Amalm), a young up-and-coming amateur boxing champion. Anthony’s life is filled with violence inside and outside the ring thanks to his job as a bouncer and friend’s troublemaking. But mostly Anthony is just another kid in a man’s body who doesn’t quite know what he wants from life besides his father’s approval.

An ex-boxer from Sicily, Joe Argo (Ennio Fantastichini) has been coaching his son since he was a small boy and runs a backyard gym where other local youths train. Anthony is Joe’s pride, though it seems less so as a son and rather as a means through which he lives his own failed dreams of success in the ring. When Anthony becomes distracted by a new girl in his life, rebelling against his father’s plans, Joe throws his son out of home and adopts another boxer as his protégé.

There’s not much in the way of originality in Two Fists, as a drama it is predictable and as a sports movie it's inevitable. There is, however, a mature confidence in the storytelling accompanied by engaging performances and a film that is really quite compelling.

Amalm employs some considerable charm in keeping Anthony on the right side of likeable and enjoys genuinely endearing moments with girlfriend Kate (Jessica Marais) in-between bouts of fisticuffs with local louts and larrikins, never losing touch of his frustration amidst an ever-present undercurrent of tension. A word of credit is due Jessica Marais for a strong female performance in a movie otherwise dominated by fistfuls of machismo.

It is, meanwhile, Fantastichini who really steals the show – the Italian actor commanding the screen with resolute authority, never wavering as the family patriarch who demands absolute commitment from his son with no thought to the world outside of his training regime. Joe’s own history is etched quite literally on his body like ring patterns on an ancient tree: a history that drives his actions and clouds his judgement.

And so at the heart of Two Fists remains this relationship between a father and his son, grounded in realism by Rai Fazio’s autobiographical script in which he has crafted an emotionally satisfying story alongside a sporting cliché you can cheer for. Fazio himself gets to star in the film as Nico, the Sicilian ex-con who becomes Joe’s surrogate son before betraying him for riches and glamour offered by a hand-wringing local promoter.

Director Shawn Seet and cinematographer Hugh Miller (who replicates elements of his Three Blind Mice lens) show real flare in their compositions, capturing the script's sense of realism whilst finding moments of romance in the city landscape and mystique in the backyard gym. Creative camera angles, stolen reflections and gorgeous sunsets paint a film that is beautiful to look at and consistently compliments the storytelling within each frame.

It is in this final stretch Two Fists stumbles as it rushes toward the final showdown, albeit in a forgivable fashion. The time-honoured training montage stirs a little excitement, though mostly lands with the dull thud of a telegraphed right hook. Fazio’s Nico becomes little more than another one-dimensional man-to-beat metaphor of overcoming personal adversity a la Ivan Draco or Clubber Lang. The film also struggles to find a conclusion to contemplations of violence, justified or otherwise, instead choosing to tie them off a little too conveniently.

That said amidst the excellent fight sequences, climaxing with Nico and Anthony’s big title fight, the emotional payoffs are all delivered on cue and are just as satisfying. Two Fists One Heart isn’t exactly a film with a wealth of depth to reach into, but it is an honest film. Love, violence, betrayal, sport, and family: all form key ingredients for a hearty serving of quality drama. It might not be particularly original, but sometimes it’s just the way they tell them.

Two Fists One Heart is released in Australia nationwide 19 March, 2009.

Shotgun Critic #4: Appaloosa

2009-03-14T21:37:00.006+11:00

Building them up or tearing them down in 5 minutes...ish

I actually got a chance to watch Appaloosa after all and while I don't have time to write a full review I thought I should resurrect the Shotgun Critic for this film. Ed Harris has directed a film that is better placed in the 1950s canon of Westerns as we find it inspired mostly Rio Bravo and Shane in it's romantic, moral notions. But in cinema today it feels like a film with no edge.

Appaloosa takes an odd comic tone throughout from its bizarre choices in music, farcical love entanglements (with Renee Zellweger of all people), and its mocking characterisation of Harris' otherwise steely sheriff Virgil Cole. There is definitely some hint of post-Brokeback homoerotic curiousity in Cole's relationship with his partner in law-keeping Everett Hitch played by Viggo Mortensen. In fact Mortensen once again is standout in this film as the professional gunslinger who chooses to be a lawman and is happy to take the take backseat to partner Cole despite being smarter and possibly quicker. No real climatic gunfight to speak of though it certainly ends with a smoking gun.

No much for anyone other than a Western aficionado and even then it's a stretch. The film mostly lands pretty flat beyond the cool of Virgil Cole's posturing in the face of many guns possessed by men who aren't really prepared to die. I did however love a moment after the film's one good showdown when Everett Hitch notes that it was over faster than normal to which Cole replies" "That's cos everyone knew how to shoot." Great Western observation in an otherwise bland movie.

Shout out

2009-03-12T15:10:00.004+11:00

Word on the Twitter board is that Dark Habits got a shout out from the /Filmcast (with guest Kevin Smith who funnily enough I interviewed a few years back for Jersey Girl) for my interview with Zack Snyder, which is totally awesome on several levels. Just thought I'd say thanks to Dave Chen for the plug and welcome to anyone who bothers to swing by and check out Dark Habits.

Keep up the good work Dave, Devindra and Adam, love the /Filmcast and anyone who hasn't should totally check it out. If my carload of readers can add to their minions then my work here is done.

Classic Scene #4: "I'm in my prime"

2009-03-12T13:20:00.005+11:00

Doc Holliday shows off his shot glass skills in Tombstone.

Appaloosa is out this Friday in Australia and I haven't got to see it – being a huge fan of the Western genre I'm somewhat irked even though I've only heard middling things about this Ed Harris directed film. In meantime I thought I'd just throw out a scene from a film that may not be significant in the Western canon but is certainly a lot of fun and features a remarkable cast that includes Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday, Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp, Sam Elliott and Bill Paxton as Earp's brothers, Michael Biehn, Terry O'Quinn, and even Billy Zane is in there.

The scene in Tombstone that always sticks out in my mind is not the gunfight at the O.K Corral, which is great by the way and has some revisionist element to its execution, but the scene in which Biehn as Johnny Ringo and Kilmer as Holliday face off for the first time in the saloon where the Earps are running cards. The setting is about as far from Deadwood as you could expect, plenty of colourful 90s blockbuster glam in there, but what makes the scene is the pure charisma of Kilmer as Holliday.

The Clatons show up to warn the Earps about trying to enforce the law in Tombstone and instead it turns into a pissing contest in Latin between Ringo and Holliday as the two of the most reputed gunslingers in the west, "watch it Johnny, I hear he's real fast," warns Curly Bill (Powers Boothe). Ringo pulls his gun on Holliday, who doesn't react knowing that he's just posturing and showing off how fast he is, then does all manner of twirling and spinning impressing everyone in the crowd. There's great shot of Bill Paxton who's eyes can barely keep up with Ringo's gun.

After his display Holliday dissolves all the tension in the room and shows he has no need to rise to Ringo intimidation by showing his own skills spinning his shot cup on his finger before pretending to holster it. It's a great moment of humour, charisma, machismo and some downright cool gunplay. Val Kilmer completely steals this whole movie and really lays down one of my favourite portrayals of a Western icon. Check out the scene after the bump with a little translation from Google of their chat in Latin.

Doc Holliday: In vino veritas.
"In wine is truth"
Johnny Ringo: Age quod agis.
"Do what you do"
Doc Holliday: Credat Judaeus apella, non ego.
"The Jew Apella may believe it, not I"
Johnny Ringo: Eventus stultorum magister.
"Events are the teachers of fools"
Doc Holliday: In pace requiescat.
"Rest in peace"

Film review: Friday The 13th (2009)

2009-03-10T00:36:00.014+11:00

Director: Marcus Nispel
Cast: Jared Padalecki, Amanda Righetti, Travis Van Winkle, Derek Mears
Country: USA
Year: 2009

"You have perfect nipple placement, baby" – Trent (Travis Van Winkle)

Girl! Woods! Running! Rain! Exposition (zzz). Jason Voorhees lives! Five kids go camping, wonder what’ll happen to them. Two hot chicks: check. Two boyfriends: check. One dweeb: check. Camp Crystal Lake, [quiet] yay. Jason! Slash! Thud! Death! Horror! Sex! Hmm, pretty pornographic sex. Slash/thud: more death, more horror, less sex. Repeat. Oh, it’s just the prologue. Cue six weeks later tile, cue same 15-minute narrative stretched out over 80. Jason. Tits. Murder. Horror… Oh, the horror.

Hearing news that the guy who remade Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) was taking on Friday The 13th there frankly weren’t many who breathed some sigh of relief, whispering to fellow slasherphiles ‘phew, thank God they’re laying to rest the time they sent Jason into space. Credibility here we come’. But studio hack Marcus Nispel manages to make this reboot/remake/rehash almost as laughable, turning the cash-grab into a carnival of cliché, a pukepile of absurd toss that is as dull as it is derivative. That he has done so with such obvious aplomb and muster would be almost be charming if you weren’t expected to pay $15 to endure it.

After the lively campsite massacre of his opening salvo Nispel introduces us to some slightly more recognisable high school drama has-beens, not-quites and Jared Padalecki. The only other memorable cast member here might be Travis Van Winkle. Now there are assholes in the world and there are caricature assholes devised with the sole purpose of being victims of horrible (deserving) deaths in slasher flicks. In this Van Winkle plays the part he was seemingly born for and is rewarded with some of the many best bad lines the script has to offer.

I suppose it might be unfair to target specific actors in this yawn fest but the moment they signed up for the roles of ‘Generic Dickhead’, ‘Token Asian Guy’, ‘Local Hick’, ‘Chick Who Gets Boobs Out II’ and ‘Jared Padalecki’ they knew what they were getting into. Unsurprisingly it is Padalecki who gets the films only plot: ‘Jared Padalecki searches for missing sister Amanda Righetti while everyone dies’. Which I suppose is fine as device to get him to Camp Crystal until it is used to change Jason’s modus operanti who makes a lateral merger into kidnapping; these are tough times after all.

While you contemplate that radical departure be assured the rest of Friday The 13th demands nothing more than your tolerance of an entire cast of unlikeable characters. Slashers have always set certain people up for a great kill to be accompanied by a (sort of) guilt free cheer, but there are usually one or two people amongst the fray to root for. Not so here, the sooner Jason dispatches this collection rabble of losers the better.

It’s hard to find anything good to say other than to compliment Jason on his formidable archery skills after witnessing them first hand killing off a guy who managed to stick around for three seasons of Veronica Mars despite being of no interest to anyone. Kills-wise it might also be the most surprising, if only because of it didn’t involve having Jason SUDDENLY materialise right behind an unsuspecting victim.

Actually Derek Mears takes on The Hockey Mask with relative competence for a guy who just has to wield a large machete and appear menacing out of nowhere whenever we expect him to. Oh and the boobs were pretty good too I suppose.

Friday The 13th is released nationally in Australia 12 March, 2009

DVD: Ran: Special Edition

2009-03-09T02:43:00.003+11:00

Director: Akira Kurosawa
Starring: Tatsuya Nakadai, Satoshi Terao Taro, Jinpachi Nezu
Year made: 1985

King for a day

Akira Kurosawa may have been 75 years old when he made Ran, but he certainly had not lost his touch. It might not be the old master’s best film but it is certainly one of his grandest.

Following in the footsteps of Throne Of Blood, which was an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Ran takes the story of King Lear and places it firmly in feudal 16th Century Japan in such a unique way it equals any telling of the English playwright’s work. Kurosawa spent a decade preparing himself to make this epic a final coup de grace in the twilight of his career.

The result, while at times indulging itself a little too much in classic Shakespearian pageantry, is quite spectacular and affirms the fact forevermore that no one could better AK when it came to ambitious battle scenes. And Ran is littered with them, all incredibly choreographed and executed perfectly.

After ruling his land for nearly half a century, the Great Lord Hidetora Ichimonji decides the time has come to pass on his power and land to his three sons; Taro, Jiro and Saburo. Hidetora dreams of peace in his region and hopes for his children to always remain allies. However, Saburo, the youngest of the brothers, is uncomfortable with the whole situation and voices his immense dissatisfaction with the arrangements and is subsequently banished from the kingdom.

It does not take long for the youngest prince’s fears to come to fruition as chaos begins to consume when civil war breaks out between the ruling lords. The Great Lord goes mad as a result of the betrayal his two elder children show in their greed and hunger for power, forgetting any honourable duty they ought to hold towards their father.

Ran is filled with wonderful standout performances throughout, in particular from Tatsuya Nakadia as the Great Lord who is as gripping as he is mesmerising, capturing the descent into insanity of Hidetora in true tragic Shakespearian tradition.

The last word has to be reserved for the man Kurosawa who has quite simply put together a film of incredible magnitude and brilliant vision. At worst it could be accused of being indulgent, but this is Shakespeare so a little drama and grandeur is never far away.

It is a real letdown that more has not been done with this supposed two-disc special edition. The Region 1 Masterworks Edition features two commentaries from Kurosawa and Japanese culture scholars, which would have made for fascinating listening for those wanting to learn more about the director and are sorely missing from this release.

What lifts this disc from the gutter though, is a very good 71-minute documentary on the making of Ran. It is rammed with behind-the-scenes footage and covers the full scale of Kurosawa’s challenge, his meticulous rehearsal process and an exploration of his techniques and trademarks.

This may not be the most comprehensive DVD treatment of a Kurosawa film, but what there is cannot be faulted.

Film 5 stars
Extras 2 stars

Special features
• ‘AK The Making Of Ran’ documentary (71 mins)

If you like this why not try…
Throne Of Blood (1957)
Akira Kurosawa’s reworking of Shakespeare’s Macbeth to 16th Century Japan is one of his finest works.

This review first appeared in DVD Review #64

DVD: Labyrinth

2009-03-09T02:35:00.002+11:00

Director: Jim Henson
Starring: Jennifer Connelly, David Bowie, Shari Weiser (voice)
Year made: 1986

Maze of misadventure

Whatever the reason, the Eighties has become a cool decade again. However, nothing can make the lunchbox-revealing grey jodpers David Bowie wears in Labyrinth anything other than a little disturbing. If you can ignore this and allow yourself to be lost in Jim Henson’s imagination then you will surely feel the nostalgic memories come flooding back.

Of course you have to wonder how a film where a camped up Bowie kidnaps a baby, then makes strange advances on a 16-year old girl would go down in the present climate. You might also spend time considering how he managed to retain any credibility after such a shoddy performance. But such thoughts are secondary to the enjoyment to be had in Henson’s wonderful characters and landscape.

Jennifer Connelly plays Sarah, who wishes the Goblin King would take her baby brother away. He does, and the only way she can get him back is by solving the riddle-infested Labyrinth, surviving perils like ‘the bog of eternal stench’ and taming David Bowie’s hairdo.

Even 18 years on there isn’t much that can top the style and character that the Henson workshop created in its puppets. The likes of Ludo, an orange Yeti-like creature, and Hoggle, Sarah’s begrudging guide, still look as realistic as they do fantastic.

As per usual, again we have a disc flagged up as a collector’s edition without offering much in the way of extras. Some contemporary retrospective featurettes would have made good additions but all the DVD has to speak of is a making-of documentary filmed at the time. This said the 56 minutes are of a high quality. All the main culprits are on hand to talk, from Henson himself, to Bowie, to Brian Froud to screenwriter Terry Jones.

What is particularly pleasing is the vast quantity of behind-the-scenes footage that will leave you with a qualified appreciation of the work that goes into puppeting each and every Muppet.

Weird and wonderful, everyone should lose themselves in this Labyrinth.

Film 4 stars
Extras 2 stars

Special features
• ‘Making Of The Labyrinth’ documentary (56 mins)
• Photo gallery
• Storyboards
• Filmographies

If you like this why not try...
The Dark Crystal (1992)
Jim Henson’s first foray into the dark side with lashing of mysticism and muppets: magic.

The review first appeared in DVD Review #63

DVD: The Dark Crystal

2009-03-09T02:23:00.004+11:00

Directors: Jim Henson, Frank Oz
Voice of: Stephen Garlick, Lisa Maxwell, Billie Whitelaw
Year made: 1982

A step into the dark

Do not underestimate the power of the dark side. In a foray away from all things bright and cheerful Jim Henson dipped his toes into some unfamiliar murky waters with this fantastical story of Gelflings, Skeksis and Mystics. It was 1982 and the film that spurned many a childhood memory was The Dark Crystal.

As the tagline truthfully declares this is ‘another world, another time… in the age of wonder.’ It is not so much the complexity of the tale that the master storyteller is telling, but the way in which he tells it; through another wonderful fantasy world transported from his imagination to celluloid.

A thousand years ago this world was split when the dark crystal was broken and a shard lost. Since then the evil Skeksis (think vultures) have ruled the land while their counterparts, the peaceful Mystics (sort of large Muppet gypsies) have just hung out waiting in their commune for a prophecy to be fulfilled: at the time of the great conjunction of the three suns a Gelfling (Jen) will make the crystal whole again and end the Skeksis’ reign.

The nostalgic value of The Dark Crystal is high but beware of your expectations: time and technology have not been kind to what was groundbreaking work at the time. It still looks great though, if you can get thoughts of Spider-Man flying through New York out of your head. This is not helped by the lack of effort that has gone into remastering the picture to a treatment one might rightly expect of a collector’s edition disc. There is another disappointment and that is the dropping of the DTS soundtrack that was provided on the Superbit version.

Appeasing some of your expectations is an excellent 60-minute featurette, ‘The World Of The Dark Crystal’, produced in 1982. It is a great document charting the evolution of Henson’s creation with contributions from the man himself offering numerous observations over the nature of his work on the project. The disc is rounded off with some stocking filler deleted scenes and a collection of image and text-based extras. A collector’s edition they do not make, but a valuable edition to your collection nonetheless.

A great film on a disappointing DVD.

Film 3 stars
Extras 3 stars

Special Features
• ‘The World Of The Dark Crystal’ documentary
(60 mins)
• Deleted scenes
• Original language work print scenes
• Character profiles
• Character illustrations
• ‘The Mithra Treatment’: Jim Henson’s original
treatment of the film
• Storyboards
• Filmographies
• Theatrical trailer

If you like this why not try…
Labyrinth (1986)
David Bowie sings, Jennifer Connelly gets lost and the Muppets… well, they act like Muppets.

The review first appeared in DVD Review #63

DVD: There’s Something More About Mary

2009-03-09T02:10:00.004+11:00

Directors: Bobby and Peter Farrelly
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Ben Stiller, Matt Dillon
Year made: 1998

Mary, Mary, quite contrary

Thank God for the Farrelly brothers. Without them, guys around the world might still be going out on dates with loaded guns – and as we know, “People get hurt that way.”

This was just one of the many lessons to be learned from There's Something About Mary, as well as a multitude of new ways to describe ‘choking the chicken’. Only the most anti-PC viewer can watch without realising there is something grim about the brothers Farrelly. No joke is too rude, crude or lewd in their so-called gross-out comedy fashion. And if you can’t stand the heat get the disc out your spinner.

From painful zipper encounters to particularly salty hair gel, the Farrellys succeed in their efforts to shock and entertain. Ted (Stiller) is in love with Mary (Diaz). He hasn’t seen her for 13 years and sends private detective Pat Healy (Dillon) to find her, who in turn also falls for Mary. Despite all its attempts to turn your head in disgust at the gall of their humour, Mary has a tender, heart-warming streak a mile wide running through it that’s impossible to ignore.

On first inspection this looks to be a quality special edition. However, it does seem to be one of those examples of quantity over quality. The disc includes a second version with 14 extended scenes, which dilute the overall tone and pace of the movie.

While the Farrellys’ commentary is intermittently enjoyable it does frequently descend into a holiday slideshow, with Peter and Bobby taking great pains to point out all their friends and family. ‘Getting Behind Mary’ is the best of the rest. It features loads of behind-the-scenes footage cut with interviews of Diaz, Stiller and Dillon. The other extras are disappointing filler-fodder, while the interview roulette with Harland Williams is just not funny at all.

Definitely more about Mary, just not enough.

Film 5 stars
Extras 3 stars

If you like this why not try…
Kingpin (1996)
Underrated Farrellys film, sitting somewhere in between The Hustler and The Big Lebowski.

Special Features
• Audio commentary by directors Bobby and Peter Farrelly
• Audio commentary by writers Ed Dector and John J Strauss
• 14 extended scenes with seamless branching (25 mins)
• ‘Getting Behind Mary’ documentary (43 mins)
• ‘AMC Backstory: There’s Something About Mary’ featurette (20 mins)
• ‘Comedy Central Reel Comedy: There’s Something About Mary’ featurette (21 mins)
• ‘Best Fight’ spoof award footage (Ben Stiller And Puffy The Dog) (3 mins)
• ‘Frank And Beans: A Conversation With W. Earl Brown’ featurette (6 mins)
• ‘Touchdown: A Conversation With Brett Farve’ (6 mins)
• Interview roulette with Harland Williams (7 mins)
• ‘Puffy, Boobs And Balls’ featurette (11 mins)
• Outtakes
• ‘Build Me Up Buttercup’ Karaoke video
• Music video
• Theatrical trailer
• Easter eggs

The review first appeared in DVD Review #64

DVD: Stuck On You

2009-03-09T00:40:00.005+11:00

Directors: Bobby and Peter Farrelly
Starring: Greg Kinnear, Matt Damon, Eva Mendes
Year made: 2003

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

The Farrelly brothers’ brand of humour may not be for everyone but the writers/directors certainly have drifted from the extremities of Dumb And Dumber and Something About Mary into far more sentimental territory. Stuck On You's softening touch might not be to general audience’s liking either.

The stars of the Rhode Island drama society on this occasion are conjoined twins Bob (Damon) and Walt (Kinnear). When Walt decides it’s time to leave their small community in Martha’s Vinyard, where they both run a fast food restaurant, to pursue his dream of becoming an actor Bob doesn’t exactly have much choice other than to go along. Of course, Los Angeles is not a forgiving place, even to the beautiful people, and success proves to be more than a little tricky.

The gags are becoming more slapstick than the gross-out we have come to expect but it is not the Farrellys that make it play this time but standout performances from Kinnear and Damon, who are nothing if not entertaining.

Once again the commentary is more of an identity parade of the Farrellys’ friends and family than an insight to their moviemaking style. The two main featurettes, ‘It’s Funny’ and ‘Stuck Together’, are both humourous but flirt with the now clichéd notion of how great it is to be one of Peter or Bobby’s friends.

‘Making It Stick’ proves to be interesting for about 60 seconds until you realise what you’re about to watch is two men standing having makeup done for another eight minutes. The blooper reel, however, is great value and a nice way to round things off.

Funny in parts, but not classic Farrellys.

Film 3 stars
Extras 3 stars

Special features
• Audio commentary by directors Bobby and Peter Farrelly
• Eight deleted/extended scenes (with optional commentary)
• Blooper reel
• ‘It’s Funny: The Farrelly Formula’ featurette (16 mins)
• ‘Stuck Together: Bringing Stuck On You To The Screen’ featurette (13 mins)
• ‘Making It Stick: The Makeup Effects Of Stuck On You’ featurette (9 mins)

If you like this why not try…
Dumb & Dumber (1994)
One of the stupidest movies of all time, also one of the most fun.

This review first appeared in DVD Review #64

Combination controversy: update

2009-03-05T11:03:00.003+11:00

Really don't have much time to post right now, currently super-snowed under with work for 3D World (interview with Neville Staple of The Specials and a column amongst other things) and preparing music for DJing Friday night, but I though I'd really better just give an update on The Combination. Following Greater Union's decision at the weekend to yank the movie from screens in Sydney after fights had been reported, which distributor Australian Film Syndicate's responded to with a big pr push against the move, the film has been reinstated into at least the Parramatta GU under an agreement that will see screenwriter/star George Basha introduce screenings in a bid to prevent any further trouble. You can read the full story at Inside Film. The Combination has impressively taken some $188,000 in four days from 32 screens. This little debacle should help keep those numbers ticking along.

Human Cyborg Relations and Terminator Salvation

2009-03-03T11:58:00.007+11:00

"You think you're human?" – John Connor

One of my earliest profound experiences in cinema was seeing James Cameron's original Terminator movie. It was probably the darkest, bleakest film experiences I'd had up until that point and it featured Bill Paxon dressed up like a punk rocker and getting stabbed by a naked Arnold Schwarzenegger in the first five-minutes. Crazy. Between the first film and Terminator 2 I salivated at the prospect of seeing the future post-apocalyptic world envisioned by Cameron as a place where humans are hunted down by robots only to fight back under the leadership of John Connor and realised in its own standalone film. Now that time is nearly upon us and the last person I would have expected to be delivering on it was McG.

Here it is, the second trailer for Terminator Salvation which is currently hosted on Yahoo! Movies. It certainly gives a better idea of what we might be able to expect and what kind of weight the screenwriters (Jonathan Nolan, Anthony E. Zuiker, Shawn Ryan, Paul Haggis) who have worked on the project have been able to insert into this massive studio project. It's Warner Bros and that gives me hope, but it also big budget and the pressure is on to prevent an R-rating. Four screenwriter credits isn't the most appealing advertisement, but considering the hoops this story has been through with the studio it's unsurprising. I'm feeling pretty good about this film right now, especially the concept of Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington) the discontinued terminator who believes he is human. Plot synopsis after the jump, trailer looking suitably mechanised and grundgy is embedded below:

Set in post-apocalyptic 2018, John Connor (Christian Bale), the man fated to be the leader of the human resistance against Skynet and its army of Terminators, and the future he was raised to believe in is altered in part by the appearance of Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a stranger whose last memory is of being on death row. Connor must decide whether Marcus has been sent from the future or rescued from the past. As Skynet prepares its final onslaught, Connor and Marcus both embark on an odyssey that takes them into the heart of Skynet's operations, where they find out a terrible secret that may lead to the possible annihilation of mankind.

Violence and The Combination

2009-03-02T10:27:00.020+11:00

Barely a month since news about a stabbing in a US cinema during a screening of My Blood Valentine we now have stories breaking (ABC.net) over the weekend regarding Australia film The Combination and a couple of punch ups that erupted at screenings. While the My Bloody Valentine incident was a one off by a frustrated security guard, I wonder if we'd be getting different responses with questions of violence on film reflected by violence in life if it had been committed by a patron. The Combination on the other hand is a film about Lebanese-Australians and gang violence in Sydney's western suburbs. A couple of incidents over the weekend has led to cinema chain Greater Union pulling the film from its theatres in New South Wales...

One has to question this decision by Greater Union as being extremely reactionary and furthermore wonder about whether any time was taken over the implications of this decision. Obviously such incidents are ugly and unwanted, but there's more than a little irony in the fact that a film about prejudice and stereotypes has led to such a media storm see (The Buck Stops 'ere summary) considering we have fights breaking out in every pub in Australia every night and I'm yet to hear a peep about prohibition (see bottom of page re: 2am Lockouts).

The Combination is a violent film although screenwriter George Basha is quoted saying “this film doesn't glorify violence, doesn't glorify gangs; it's actually the opposite.” This may not be entirely true considering the film's violent conclusion (certainly being in a gang doesn't come across that cool), but what is suspect is the precise thinking behind the decision at Greater Union to pull the film from all its screens in NSW (a decision it's considering recanting). I'm sure staff safety is a concern for management, but does Greater Union really think that this film's patrons are more likely to be so incensed by its content that we might see riots breaking out up and down George Street? What does this say about the Greater Union's management's perception of The Combination's target audience.

As Basha is further quoted in The Australian: "You've got 300 or 400 people in the cinema, and then you've got three or four kids, 15 and 16 years old, making a nuisance... The cinema is saying they were smoking in the cinema, and there were fights breaking out ... I've seen fights happen. I'm pretty sure those films didn't get closed down."

There's a much bigger discussion to be had here, but I wanted to post these quick thoughts before I get on with my day whilst the tabloids set about exploiting Australian fears over some sort of implied dark danger lurking within Sydney's western suburbs. The Combination was always an interesting film to me as a non-Aussie and for reasons unrelated to the violence within, now it's becoming positively fascinating.

You can read my review of The Combination here,
or
Read my interview with director David Field here.

Watch the trailer here:

UPDATE: Re: 'peeps about prohibition', it has been pointed out to me that while 2am lockouts are not quite the same thing as prohibition they are a form of restriction on drinking freedom.

Classic Scene #3: "It's pretty good isn't it"

2009-03-02T00:00:00.010+11:00

'The Jaguar Shark' scene in The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou

I promise to run a scene that isn't a ending next time round, but the moments I found myself thinking about today were the huge spoiler scene in LA Confidential and the ending of The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004). Whilst The Royal Tenenbaums is easily be my favourite Wes Anderson film The Life Aquatic might be the one I hold dearest. Maligned and underappreciated on its release, this is a film that will reward those who return to it and could even be a most necessary film for anyone who finds doubt in their purpose or generally suffering from melancholic maladies.

Watching Life Aquatic the first time round I confess was roundly baffled by the point so close the movie itself skirted with meaninglessness in its whimsical meanderings, entertaining and colourful though they certainly were. I got that this was a Moby Dick parody about revenge and one man facing the reality that he is over-the-hill, broken both emotionally and in practicality, chasing little more than his own lost dreams. But until the end it all seemed somewhat hollow, all style and literally no heart only a malaise. Rarely have I experienced all the pieces of a character puzzle so subtly and melodically fall into place as the Life Aquatic's climactic scene, which took me to a place I never expected and landed a heart-rendering sucker punch squarely on my gut.

This is a fragile piece of cinema no doubt, a portrait that takes its time to unfold. Bill Murray was in a class of his own at the time, but the emotion he packs into a character so tired and so stiff totally sweeps me off my feet every time I see this scene. Upon finally discovering the Jaguar Shark deep in the ocean accompanied by his team, estranged-wife (Anjelica Huston), journalist (Cate Blanchett) and rival (Jeff Goldblum), Steve Zissou no longer wants to blow it up, "we're out of dynamite anyway," he quips. When he wonders out loud if the shark remembers him and the emotion squeezes its way onto his face we recognise a profound moment in this character's essence of being and the deep sadness that comes with the realisation of dreams that were never really about the object of the obsession, rather they are just the symbol of something much deeper and personal.

And all this occurs to the wonderful 'Staralfur' by Sigur Ross, a band whose musically I could quite fittingly lose myself for in eternity. Enough from me, check out the scene below and tell me what you think...

2009-03-01T18:47:00.006+11:00

Complete Watchmen coverage at Dark Habits:

WATCHMEN REVIEWED BY DARK HABITS
"If you thought The Dark Knight was good just wait till you see Watchmen…"
You can read an abridged version of this review at 3D World.
AN INTERVIEW WITH ZACK SNYDER
"Right when you start to like a character or you start to think you understand them, they do something that makes you go ‘oh fuck, that’s right he’s a Nazi’."
AN INTERVIEW WITH DEBORAH SNYDER
"I think a lot of times Hollywood wants to tie everything up in a nice little bow and happy package."
AN INTERVIEW WITH JEFFREY DEAN MORGAN
"[The Comedian] is a little bit misunderstood, I like to say he had some communication problems. He really needed to go to the Hallmark store"
AN INTERVIEW WITH MALIN AKERMAN
"Poor Billy, everyone just laughed in his face. It was just such a silly costume and he’s supposed to be this larger than life type of character and here he is looking like a human Christmas tree."
DARK HABITS FIRST REACTION TO WATCHMEN
"For the uninitiated I envy the wild ride you are about to embark on"

Film review: Watchmen

2009-03-01T18:17:00.010+11:00

Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Jackie Earle Hayley, Patrick Wilson, Malin Akerman, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Billy Crudup, Matthew Goode
Country: USA
Year: 2009

“Never compromise, not even in the face of Armageddon” – Rorschach

The camera slowly zooms out from the iconic yellow smiley face badge worn by Eddie Blake. He flicks channels on his television set as talk show hosts discuss the likelihood of nuclear Armageddon imminently faced by the human race in this alternate 1985 Cold War universe where Trick Dick Nixon is still president and the US won in Vietnam. Finally he settles on a channel with promise of a better life as Nat King Cole sings ‘Unforgettable’. It’s the last momentary ironic pleasure of his life because The Comedian dies tonight.

Welcome to the world of Watchmen, an unparalleled comic book world that was for 20 years deemed unfilmmable and yet now finds itself released in a hail of cinematic glory. The so-called Citizen Kane of graphic novels massively anticipated by a rabid fanbase should not disappoint in its big screen debut because director Zack Snyder’s (300) loving adaptation is all and more that they could have reasonably hoped for. And for the curious uninitiated whose perception of the comic book genre is about to change forever? If you thought The Dark Knight was good just wait till you see Watchmen…

Contained within the glorious opening punch-up and the wonderfully vaudevillian credits sequenced played out to Bob Dylan's 'The Times They Are A-Changing' are the beats, themes and spirit in which Snyder has captured the essence of author Alan Moore’s opus to masked heroes and a world consumed by madness. Darkness, the loss of innocence, human determinism and mutually assured destruction are all-pervasive.

Some of the novel’s elements such as the ‘Tales Of The Black Freighter’ (to be inserted in Snyder’s ultimate director’s cut) have been mined out altogether while other subplots (the home lives of psychiatrists) are stripped down in order to do justice to the story’s central narrative inside three hours. But Snyder, using David Hayter and Alex Tse’s screenplay, resolutely stays true to the mean streets neo-noir of Rorschach’s (Jackie Earle Hayley) pursuit of The Comedian’s (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) killer. As Rorschach was to the novel Hayley is to the film, brilliant as the menacing, snarling vigilante with sociopathic tendencies to be found wandering the rain and vice-drenched city at night.

What makes Hayley’s performance so impressive is the fact the vast majority of it takes place behind Rorschach’s ink-oscillating mask. Reciting portions of his character’s journal Hayley is able to convey every drip of bitter disgust, anger, suspicion and resoluteness that lies underneath the many faces of Rorschach and when he is called upon to unleash all the rage he can muster in his origin story we feel the ripples of a character changed forever. Remove the mask and Hayley is simply terrifying as Walter Kovacs, a man whose fierce nature belie his appearance and stature. This is an outstanding performance, one that will be remembered as one of 2009’s standouts.

And this is just one of Watchmen’s casting success. Hayley finds his equal in Patrick Wilson’s excellent realisation of washed-up Nite Owl II Dan Dreiberg, always with a simmering strength beneath a bookish exterior. Wilson plays Dreiberg as the geeky wannabe who never felt like he fitted in with the cool kids perhaps because he wasn’t insane enough. He needn't have feared, turns out Dreiberg has mental problems of his own and is literally rendered impotent by an inferiority complex, anxiety and his refusal to accept that being a masked vigilante was what he was supposed to be all along. When the Keene act signed by President Nixon outlawed his chosen profession, he complied willingly whilst his partner Rorschach continued recognising what Dreiberg failed to see, that he was giving up not just on vigilantism but on a world gone to pot.

Whilst Wilson and Hayley seamlessly translate their character from page to screen, it is worth noting that Morgan perhaps elevates his, finding untapped charisma and new depths of tragedy in one of literature’s greats. This dystopian Captain America who actions horrify at every juncture is the mirror of the world we have come to inhabit, a parody of a dream lost and an innocence sacrificed. Just as Rorschach says, The Comedian “saw the world for what is really was”: capitalism, war, fascism/greed, violence, moral corruption – these are the things that have largely come to define civilisation. Yet despite a modus operandi that is sheer nihilism, Morgan finds the conflict within the man Eddie Blake and his creation The Comedian. He’s a murdering, would-be rapist sonofabitch, but damn if we don’t find ourselves empathising with him in the end thanks to Morgan.

Malin Akerman bravely assumes the mantle of the slightly thankless role of Laurie Jupiter/Silk Spectre II sometimes struggling with clunky dialogue but always bringing some sense of depth to her character, finding hurt, pain and wonder in equal measure. She also looks great and kicks ass in leather. Then there is a motion-captured Billy Crudup as the only real superhero in the movie Dr Manhattan, somehow finding emotion in the naked blue-luminous being who claims to have none. Of all the origin stories in Watchmen his 10-minute arc told during his self-imposed exile to Mars might be the most breathtaking visual and narrative achievement in the film.

Snyder revels in his 300-style speed ramping action sequences, executing them with stunning effect, without ever allowing these moments to become stylistically distracting. Punches land with thunderous impacts, bones snap and split sickeningly, knifes plunge into flesh, glass shatters and blood splatters. But this is just one element of Snyder’s visual accomplishment here, many of his frames literally pop off the graphic novel panels and are filled with just as many textured layers that Watchmen will reward repeat viewings. The film may be ripe with style, but it is never at the sacrifice of substance.

That all said, Watchmen is not without its flaws. Firstly Matthew Goode feels miscast as the world’s smartest man Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias and is largely disconnected from the audience in the overall narrative despite his centrality to the climax. Though Goode manages to find a certain leering arrogance in Veidt we are never given a chance to consider his character beyond his actions, which are admittedly significant but revealed hurriedly by a film already clocking up some serious minutes. This has the added effect of making his role in Watchmen’s third act somewhat jarring even for knowledgeable members of the audience: it’s for this reason if anything, and not the absence of giant squids, that the ending suffers.

There are other minor quibbles, the worst offender being a pretty erotic sex scene cut to Leonard Cohen’s version of ‘Hallelujah’ that’s a leather boot fetishist’s dream come true (especially disappointing given all the other excellent music choices made by Snyder and the fact that Jeff Buckley’s really is the definitive version of ‘Hallelujah’, albeit an overplayed one).

But for now space is almost certainly better spent focussed on Watchmen’s successes as a comic book movie for the ages: one that is deeply intellectual, emotionally satisfying, uncompromisingly violent and a visceral, unrelenting assault on the senses. This is “as dark as it gets” says Rorschach; and Watchmen is all the more astonishing for it.

Scott Henderson

Watchmen is released in Australian cinemas March 5.
An abridged version of this review appears in 3D World #949

Interview: Zack Snyder (Watchmen)

2009-02-27T01:48:00.014+11:00

For 20 years Watchmen has been lauded not only the Holy Grail of the comic book genre, but also its poisoned challis. This graphic novel set in an alternate 1985 where Tricky Dick is still President, heroes don’t have superpowers, and an entire meta-fiction can be woven into the fabric of a neo-noir murder-mystery. A comic book that takes on themes of human determinism, the loss of innocence, nihilism and apocalypse. They said it was unfilmmable.

Years of Development Hell passed by, seeing Terry Gilliam, Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greengrass all attached to direct at various stages until in 2006 Zack Snyder got the call that would send him on a three year journey to this point, sat in Sydney’s Intercontinental Hotel with a journalist also a long way from home.

When I met Zack he is a bundle of energy and enthusiasm on this first leg of the press tour. A one point in our interview he stands up and paces a little, gesticulating with his all of his arms and hands to convey some point how crazy all this is whilst talking a dozen words a second. It’s infectious and it is in this moment I can see how this Zack Snyder could have be entrusted to direct such a treasured property as Watchmen – it's not completely tangible, but it is absolutely apparent,,,

This is the first leg of the press trip then?

Yeah, these are our first interviews for the world. It’s good practice: you get all the crazy shit.

How are you feeling about the film now it’s completed?

It’s pretty exciting for me. Honestly, we’ve been working on it for three years so it’s good to have it come out.

Can you remember the first time you read the Watchmen?

It was in '88 was when the book was first novelised; I missed it as singles for whatever reason, my friends were all reading it. But Watchmen really had a big impression on me, it’s weird and interesting, I haven’t analysed it too carefully but it was one of the few things at the time that – I was in film school at the time – I didn’t think about making it into a movie. I was like it is its own thing and it can’t be a movie. So it was odd when the time came around it was me they called to say ‘hey, do you wanna make this into a movie’? Cos I’d thought about everything else, Frank Miller’s Dark Knight, Sin City, everything that came out I was like ‘I can make that into a movie’! But Watchmen for whatever reason I was like ‘man, I can’t make that into a movie’.

How did it feel then that day when they turned round and asked if you wanted to come do that with them?

It was scary. I got the first call from the studio actually, they said ‘we’ve got this thing Watchmen, would you be interested? We’ll send it over’. I was like ‘send it over, what do you mean’? The guy says to me ‘well, we’ve got this script, it’s called Watchmen, I think it’s based on a graphic novel’ [laughs hard]. Really, you think it’s based on a graphic novel – that’s scary. These are the things you hear and think ‘man are we in trouble’. The process was really about me trying to make them realise that it was based on a graphic novel and that it was something that was important to me.

That being said Warner Bros have done something special here in that you weren’t a name director at the time, the budget has been huge, R-rated, no A-listers in the cast…

Absolutely, 300 hadn’t come out yet, they didn’t know. They absolutely have done an amazing work; I mean the movie is bizarre and challenging and violent and sexual. It’s right out there. My editor and I would sit around and we’d be like… I remember when we first screened my director’s cut of the movie he looked at me and I looked at him and said ‘How are they going to release this movie? This is a crazy movie’. And I was just talking about distribution, this movie is going to play on like 5,000 screens in America. That is an assault on pop culture on an epic level. And a movie like this which I defy any to show me a movie with more male full frontal nudity in it, more real sexuality, pretty stunning violence and that’s just all the visual stuff let alone the intellectual challenges it presents too. I really think they have done an amazing job of keeping the movie intact.

How difficult a balancing act has that been content-wise? Obviously there are massive political undertones, thematically themes of humanism, determinism, and science, all on top of the violence and so on – how hard was it to honour and stay true to these element of the novel?

I think that was the process of making the movie to be honest. In a lot of movies the process is making sure the performance are real… it’s interesting because I never really thought of it from that perspective, cos normally the job of the director is to make sure there is truth, reality in the moment. Maybe he is designing shots, maybe he is thinking about story, but you know the moment-to-moment job is ‘yeah, that was real’. I never had that job, my job was never like ‘yeah, that was real’ [Snyder gets up from his chair for water and start punctuating his insights with his hands] because the movie is symbolic a lot of the time. You are constantly measuring tone, I was constantly going ‘gosh, did that feel, inexplicably Watchmen’, which, you know, is crazy hard. The most things I felt was geared around that inexplicable quality the movie had to have.

And hitting all those notes, they had to so specific because the characters are so fleshed out in the book, and it seems to me like you have struck the right tone with Rorschach and The Comedian and Dr Manhattan. Obviously Rorschach drives the story and Comedian is really important to so many of the most significant themes, they all are really but The Comedian in particular...

The Comedian is so super-important. You know, these are the kind of meetings you have. Again the studio has done an amazing job, but you can imagine the knee-jerk reactions where they are like: ‘listen, I’ve read the script, here’s a suggestion I would have: if you cut out The Comedian’s funeral, Dr Manhattan on Mars and Rorschach talking to psychiatrist you really streamline the film. That’s a way to really get the film [snaps his fingers] smoking along’. And I’m like, ‘well that’s a superhero movie, that’s a bad superhero movie that’s what that is’.

For me it was really important that The Comedian’s funeral we get that feeling he was all of their fathers in some way, he’s literally Laurie’s father but in the end he is all of their fathers. That idea of that influence he has over all of them, breaking down Dan, losing all of his idealism about what they are doing and basically planting in Adrian the seed of that the only way to win is to go all the way and also identifying with Manhattan that he has lost his connection to humanity.

Two of my favourite scenes, and it ties into what I wanted to ask you about the music choices, the opening scene with Nat King Cole, but especially the choice of Simon and Garfunkel’s 'Sounds of Silence' for the funeral, a song because of The Graduate that I always associate with the loss of innocence, American innocence specifically, and so bittersweet… it played to the whole contradictory nature of The Comedian…

Exactly. We had a great shot from the title sequence that I didn’t put in that I had to cut because it was just so long. One of them was Blake raising the flag on Iwo Jima by himself. It was just this awesome shot of him raising the flag and these two planes fly over him and I just thought it was interesting because it was the peak of his innocence. From there the atomic bomb drops on Hiroshima and I really tried to use that moment to begin the loss of innocence for American culture, and world culture by the way because that is the moment that you can mark in time where everything challenged. Adrian’s idea of killing hundreds of thousands to save millions is illustrated exactly in real life.

And it’s so interesting that this dystopian Captain America is the one who cracks…

You mean Blake? Absolutely, under that stress he becomes a monster. In some ways he goes through this naïve innocence to the complete opposite. He is completely broken and unimpressed with the world to the point of disdain.

To what extent do you think the Comedian is the sane one in this story then? While everyone else is completely insane he has a perfect understanding of it all…

That’s the argument that Rorschach makes at the end you know about who The Comedian is and I think it’s a strong argument. Look, Rorschach is insane, one of the lines I took out of the movie was the line, Debbie wanted me to take it out and I begrudgingly did, because I didn’t want people to think I was homophobic or anything because clearly I’m not, but the line where he says “possible homosexual, must investigate further” with regard to Adrian Veidt. And the reason I like the line is because right when you’re thinking you really like Rorschach and thinking he’s awesome, like ‘he’s my man’, suddenly he’s this homophobic psychopath. And you have to re-evaluate constantly how you feel. Those are the things the film does for me, right when you start to like a character or you start to think you understand them, they do something that makes you go ‘oh fuck, that’s right he’s a Nazi’.

Was that then the most controversial element of the book then that you had to translate for the film…

Well the attempted rape was a huge deal for the studio…

Which you guys have gone all the way with, I'm mean, that's a wow scene...

Yeah, all the way, it’s pretty hardcore. I just felt like if we were going to do it we had to go all the way and illustrate it. It doesn’t serve anyone, least of all the story, if you sugarcoat it. And also Blake killing the pregnant woman by the way was another huge deal. The studio were just like ‘what the fuck’? The problem is that moment is Manhattan’s, Blake could do that all day long, he’s going to walk out the door and kill someone else. But this moment is for Manhattan, Manhattan does nothing and that’s what is so interesting.

Well I just got my wrap up sign…

And I know I’m ranting, sorry.

It’s ok. So the book and the film are this fascinating examination of the human condition. How important do you this story is today? The book was written 25 years ago, and it’s still so relevant…

It’s incredibly relevant. When I first got the script it was updated to the war on terror, sending Manhattan to Iraq. ‘Are you kidding me’? I thought this is the lamest thing I ever read. It made the metaphor, it made the book irrelevant in some way because what it did to me was it said, ok, the movie comes out in a year and who knows, America leaves Iraq and Iraq is its own country. Suddenly the film has no relevance.

And the book is supposed to be an alternate universe anyway…

Absolutely. I was like, don’t you think it is way more powerful then us trying a comment about me trying to make a comment about the war in Iraq? What the fuck do I know really? I’m not on a political TV show commentating about politics, I’m just trying to comment on the human experience, which the book does really well and allows those metaphors to then say ‘that makes me feel this way about the war in Iraq’. That’s much more powerful to me than my point of view on the war in Iraq – who gives a fuck? It’s me, what do I know.

The book is amazing well written. A reporter asked me, ‘now that Barack Obama has been elected President, do you feel like the movie is less relevant’? Wow, that’s really optimistic, it’s only been a couple of weeks. I mean I hope that’s true – it’d be awesome if the movie became obsolete because we were living and everyone was holding hands and singing songs at the end. Is that a post Veidt world or a pre-Veidt world?

That was one of those things I found very fascinating, the cyclical nature of the world, now the Russians are coming back and things are crazy – it never finishes. The book really points out, so we have Vietnam, we have Iraq, we have the Cold War with the Russians, we have the war on terror – there is no end. Just like in the end of the movie we see, “I know what Jon would say.” That line in the graphic novel is given to Manhattan, “Nothing ends, nothing ever ends.” But it is interesting coming out of Laurie’s mouth because it comes at the very end of the movie and because of the cyclical nature of things it’s not the very end. It’s closure but it’s not at all. Sorry, I didn’t mean to rant.

Watchmen is released in cinemas March 6, 2009.