Birdman, The Theory of Everything & Taken 3 – Richards Reckons Reviews

HAPPY 2015 TO YOU ALL, RECKONEES! Lovely to see you again. Did you have a nice new year’s? I like your hair, have you done anything new with it? It suits you, whatever it is.

Anywho, enough of this silly ego-rubbing. We’ve got films to be reviewing. First off, Birdman – or, if you want to be specific, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance).

I won’t be specific though, just before it’s longer to type, even as an acronym.

Anyway, Birdman is a motion picture following Riggan Thomson (played by Michael “Batman” Keaton, see what they did there?), an actor who had massive commercial success with the Birdman series of films in which he played the titular character. However, this was 20 years ago and now, as he bemoans, “[he’s] just an answer to a trivial pursuit question!” – he gets vaguely recognised but isn’t working too much. So he decides to direct, write and star in a stage adaptation of Raymond Carver’s play What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. The film follows him and the people around him (including his daughter, played by Emma Stone, and his cast members including Edward Norton and Naomi Watts) for the few days leading up to the grand opening of the play, focussing on Riggan’s cracked psyche and how Birdman haunts him every single day of his life…

Birdman is not a straight forward movie to talk about (which, I know, sounds like a rubbish way to start off a review). In fact, it’s a movie that in some ways is an anti-movie, if you like; rather than constant cutting away during conversation or setpieces, as is movie law, the film is presented for the most part as if it is one long shot; never cutting away, like one fluid motion through a story. In that regard, technically speaking, Birdman is an absolute revelation. There are a couple of occasions in which, if you were feeling particularly nitpicky that day, you could notice points where they could have cut away, but for the most part there is no sign of technical trickery or anything like that; and in that regard, it’s a masterpiece.

The writing is fascinating. It’s a story about so many things, including but not limited to fame, the high/low culture divide, the nature of superhero movies, philosophical and poetic musings on life itself and the state of the actor. Yet Birdman never comes across as pretentious for exploring these areas as it has a dark comedic strain running through it like the jam of a filmic trifle. It’s strangely touching and scathing simultaneously; an example of this being Sam’s (a pale yet amazing Emma Stone’s) soliloquy about human beings trying to convince themselves that they matter when, truly, they don’t. In this same movie, Riggan also gets trapped in Times Square in just his unders. To say that it is a mixed bag would be an understatement, and it does feel as bizarre as it is dynamic, but it also gels together so well in this jazz drumming-scored exploration of Riggan’s broken mind. Michael Keaton is the best he has ever been in this role that is so parallel to his own life, and he uses it to great effect; both Riggan and his Birdman alter-ego could be his echo, and it’s played wonderfully well as he embraces the bizarreness of it all.

Birdman is a film that will rub a lot of people up the wrong way due to how weird and off key it is – indeed, when I saw it, a lot of people came out asking just what the F it was they had just seen. But that is, ultimately, what makes it glorious. The serious themes and reflection on our own culture and the condition of the entertainer, as well as the dark comedy light that it’s shown in (can you have dark light?), are things that I could write on and on and on about, but I’ll spare you. Suffice to say, director Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu will be heralded for a very long time and this film will be studied in the future, and for good reason too – it’s a modern masterpiece. A demented one, but one nonetheless.

Right then, now onto The Theory of Everything (the film, not my theory on everything – that’s something reserved for psychoanalysts).

The Theory of Everything is the expanded story of Simpsons character Stephen Hawking (HAHAHA, come on that’s a joke, I respect the guy enormously). It of course tells the story of the wonderful Stephen Hawking (Eddie Redmayne in a transformational performance), the world famous scientist who studied at Cambridge in the 60’s, where he met the first love of his life in the form of Jane (Felicity Jones). The film follows their relationship as Stephen’s motor neurone disease causes his body to deteriorate, but also follows him as he defies all expectations and becomes one of the greatest scientists the world has ever known.

A spellbinding central performance by Eddie Redmayne is what causes this to transcend the boundaries of the usual biopic. His cheeky and near constantly optimistic characterisation of Hawking is the star at the centre of this movie, making you care about him pretty much one frame into the movie; this of course makes all the funny bits funnier, the inspiring bits more inspirational and the moving bits more, er, movinger. His portrayal of Stephen as a character as well as the intricacies of his examination of his illness is amazing and a true sign of the ascent of a future star.

Felicity Jones, too, is brilliant; making Jane not only a believable presence but also somebody we constantly root for and empathise with. The affect that Stephen’s illness has on her is also what this film is about, and we feel the tug on her heartstrings too as her life pretty much gets consumed by her brilliant husband. The script too is fantastic in going through Stephen’s life at a faster-than-expected rate, but not feeling rushed or like we are missing anything. Much like The Imitation Game, if you are looking for a science lesson from this then you will be disappointed as it does not really go into Stephen’s science too much; just the gravitas that it has and the reaction it causes in people.

It’s a wonderfully sweet and memorable film that caused me to get a lump in my throat (it wasn’t my adam’s apple, I checked) on quite a few occasions. The cinematography here too is wonderful, with beautiful Cambridgeshire shots illuminated by fireworks and lanterns, and the final shots of the film (as well as the heartbreaking final line) sticking with you for a long time afterwards. The Stephen Hawking biopic is just like the man himself; brilliant, moving and a surprising amount of fun.

Finally, it’s Taken 3 time.

Yes, we get to spend yet more quality time with Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) – the most mundanely named action hero in history. In this instalment of the franchise, ol’ Bry is back living in LA, with his daughter Kim (Maggie Grace) and his ex-wife Lenore (not to be confused with the detergent of the same name. Oh and played by Famke Jassen) living close by. Everything seems happy for a bit. But, all of a sudden, Bryan is framed for Lenore’s murder and is on the run from the police and, once again, is after (for some reason) some anonymous Russian people. So, er, obviously things aren’t so happy anymore…

In Taken, it was the daughter that was being taken.

In Taken 2, it was the ex-wife that was being taken.

In Taken 3, however, it’s the piss that is being taken…

Even by Taken standards, this film doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. People’s motivations, the “twists” that happen along the way, who random people are in the background who just come in to help from out of nowhere… it’s pretty much completely nonsensical. To make matters worse, it seems to be filmed by a person who has just consumed a barrel of red bull and is riding a skateboard while trying to film what is going on – a lot of it is incoherent, with the camera on numerous occasions actually just completely missing the action altogether. It’s edited by that same person too, who doesn’t seem to want to let more than two frames pass by that are the same – even the forced, “funny” conversational bits at the beginning are shot in this way, which makes them even more annoying than usual. Honestly, those bits are cringe mode activators – Liam Neeson straining a smile through the “what the bloody hell am I doing here?” look.

I’m fine with action films being fun and defying the laws of logic and physics by quite some margin, but the fact is that Taken 3 often commits the worst crime in action blockbuster – being boring. Bryan turns up somewhere, leaving it up to our imagination how he snuck in and out, does something relatively innocuous and then leaves. There are some beat em ups and driving and shooting but that is mainly it. Taken 3, even if you are a Taken fan, is really really quite rubbish.

Magic in the Moonlight- Richards Reckons Review

Whoa whoa whoooaaa, it’s magicccc! Or is it?

Magic in the Moonlight is the new Woody Allen romantic comedy, continuing his streak of being as productive as an advent calendar factory, providing a film a year coming our way with, er, doors in it with Christmas based chocolate behind them? Maybe that analogy doesn’t work… I blame advent calendars being in the shops already.

ANYWAY, Magic in the Moonlight not only has magic in the moonlight but it also has a PLOT in the moonlight, and that plot is this; set in the 1920s, Stanley (Colin Firth) is a successful magician who performs under the moniker Wei Ling Soo around the world. In Berlin, he’s approached by an old friend of his called Howard (Simon McBurney), who asks him to join him on a trip to the French Riviera to meet a rich family who have been charmed by the mystical Sophie (Emma Stone), who he thinks may truly possess the ability to talk to the dead and clairvoyance. Stanley being a famous skeptic, he agrees to go with him to meet her, and finds himself lost for words by her abilities.

This film is set in the 1920s, and indeed feels like a movie actually SHOT in the past – from the dialogue to the setting to the plot to even the soundtrack; it feels like an older movie that’s been dipped into a sauce of modern technology (sorry, I’m hungry). As you can expect from the setting, the director and that description, it looks magnificent; the French Riviera is portrayed magnificently, with huge vistas and landscapes that echo paintings or postcards.

HOWEVER (all capitals for emphasis), just because this feels like an old-timey film does not by any means make it a good film. It may look brilliant and beautiful, but Magic in the Moonlight did not make me feel brilliant and beautiful (not that it was its mission). What I’m trying to say is that I had quite a few problems with this film. Before I go into them, this is obviously just my opinion and I think I am in the minority here, so of course take them with a pinch of salt.

Firstly, the dialogue in this film is some of the clunkiest I think I have ever seen. Some may think that this adds to its old-fashioned charm, but for me it really did not have this effect; some of the dialogue is so on-the-nose or so obviously undisguised exposition that it made me feel cold. In fact, it feels like the script was rushed, almost as if Woody wrote the lines that appear in the film as mere narrative functions with what they’re trying to convey with a note next to them saying “CHANGE THIS TO SOMETHING ELSE LATER”, but then never got around to adding his Woody Allen magic (hehe, get it?) to it. Other critics have said that the script feels rushed, and with the dialogue it really does feel that way.

Another piece of evidence for this is the plot itself and the relationships within it that feel far too rushed. Stanley remains very very skeptical for a very long time with no signs whatsoever of changing his mind, until one point where he utterly changes his point of view within a moment, without any sort of progression. Stanley forgives somebody for doing something quite bad to him very quickly afterwards, which feels extremely odd for his character. There is a twist in this movie but it’s a twist that personally I saw coming a long, long way off. I don’t want to spoil anything but towards the end of the movie, there’s a particular relationship denouement (see what I did there, with the French word?) that feels absolutely undeserved. Again, some may feel that this adds to the old fashioned feel of it, but it all personally rubbed me up the wrong way and made me disconnect from the story.

 

There are also a couple more details that grated on me the whole way through; firstly, the soundtrack. The soundtrack starts off as fitting in with the old-timey aesthetic and feels very in place as a nice touch, but then it gets extremely repetitive and grates and grates and grates and grates; feeling especially jarring when quite a serious event occurs and an upbeat 1920s jazz band starts playing to accompany it. Secondly, Stanley himself. I’m a fan of Colin Firth as an actor and I think he’s great, and it’s no fault of his that Stanley is massively unlikeable. He’s arrogant, aloof and so up himself he could be using himself as his own puppet. The fact the character switches in his opinions so quickly as said above only makes it worse. He also doesn’t ever change his personality at all to get any sort of redemption or become a better person – he remains the same, bitter bastard until the end. The screen also has the annoying-in-a-wholly-different-way Brice (Hamish Linklater), a man who is utterly infatuated with Sophie and likes to show this by generally creeping around nearby, playing an incredibly irritating ukelele singing sycophantic songs at her.

Sophie herself, the wonderful Emma Stone, is by far the highlight of the film; she plays the mystifying, beautiful yet quite shy and vulnerable Sophie very well. On the whole, there are certainly more offensive films out there, but Magic in the Moonlight feels extremely rushed, at times grating and ultimately amounts to nothing. It looks beautiful and has some great stars really giving their all to these roles, but Woody Allen certainly has a lot, lot better in him.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (review) – Richards Reckons Review

The Amazing Spider-Man 2

Sony’s decided to do a sequel for their film, originally based on the idea of becoming an anthropomorphised version of popular character Spider-Pig from The Simpsons Movie*. Good on ’em.

First of all, a brief personal history lesson on the relationship between the web-slinger and I (that sounds like we had some sort of fling which, despite the rumours, we have not). I have always been rather fond of Spider-Man as a hero for several reasons. He tackles both street level crime as well as big ol’ baddies; he’s not invincible but still, as the Yanks say, badass; he makes jokes, puns AND quips even when in the most dangerous of situations because he’s scared. For those three reasons (well, okay, maybe the last one most), coupled with him being a young man, I identified with him. As I sat as an 9 year old in front of the telly controlling Spider-Man (I had the pre-Raimi era game on PSone, I wasn’t psychic), as he took down these lawbreakers while making witty remarks, I was in awe really. The Sam Raimi trilogy was also released over the course of my teenagehood, making me identify with this geeky Peter Parker fella even more.

This leads me nicely into the overwhelming worry that the internet squawked when the trailers were released for this film; “OMG TOO MANY VILLAINS LIKE SPIDERMAN3 ITS GONNA BE TOO CROWDED AND SUCK LIKE IT DID OMG” (yep, in my mind, the internet only speaks with caps lock on and in mainly garbled sentences). I too shared this fear, that it would make it similar to the incredibly disappointing Spiderman 3. I can therefore say with a degree of relief that this film isn’t as utterly cluster-F’d or catastrophic as Spiderman 3 (for a start, there’s no montage of quiffy Peter being an absolute twit anywhere to be found in this…).

All the advertising showed 3 villains; Rhino, Green Goblin and Electro, which is what gave the internet the willies for being too many, however it really does not feel this way in the film itself. Rhino, being played by the marvellous Paul Giamatti in full on Ham mode, is more like a pair of bookends than a villain (in the sense of narrative, not potential threat – he’s a lot stronger than any bookend I’ve seen). It’s no spoiler to say that Green Goblin is more of a villain we witness being born (not literally, ew) across the film rather than a threat the whole way through. So make no mistake – in terms of villains, this is very much The Electro Show.

And it’s quite a show, too. Jamie Foxx plays the roles of the obsessive yet sympathetic Max Dillon (pre-Electro Electro, or “prelectro” if you like) and the angry and unhinged Electro very well, with aspects of the tragic Dillon character leaking out amongst the power-mad roarings. There are a few moments that don’t quite fit with the character we’d seen (at one points he growls “It’s my birthday. Time to light my CANDLES!”, which is a very Spidey thing to say considering this is just after his transformation. I winced, actually). It’s also strange (though beneficial for the running time) that he is able to understand, handle and harness his power so quickly. He has an uncanny ability too to play dubstep wherever he goes too, like a walking blue boombox with a Skrillex CD stuck in it.

The sequences themselves are inventive and, no surprises here, look great – they are a carnival of CGI, don’t get me wrong, but it’s everything you’d expect from a blockbuster such as this, with lots of money shots of Spidey slinging through the city. The performances are also strong – Andrew Garfield is given more here to prove he really is Spider-Man, unlike the first film where he is not given much room to do so. I might be somewhat biased in saying this due to my (completely healthy) infatuation with her, but Emma Stone is always a magnetic screen presence and Gwen Stacy is a great antidote to the damsel in distress role in superhero movies, even if she does seem to have superhuman sight and hearing (she’s able to recognise Max Dillon while yards away and in Smurf mode). My special mention, however, goes to Dane DeHaan as Harry Osbourne. He’s brilliant as the bitter, slimy and (eventually) deranged Harry, and I looked forward to when he was next onscreen.

The main issue with this moviefilm is that it can’t quite decide what gear to be in or for how long. It shifts between comicbook lighthandedness (if that wasn’t a word before, it is now) and fun to deep conspiracy, father issues and emotional wallop. I have no problem with either of these tones being used concurrently – in fact, I love the mixture of fun with serious – but this film seems to shift between the two with a very uneven pace, like a madman at a gearstick. There’s one particular moment which has a massive amount of emotional impact that works beautifully, and I could actually hear resonating with the audience; I obviously shan’t say who it involves, but put it this way – if you’re a comic book fan and know your Spider-Man, you can guess what’s coming…

I also had a love/hate relationship with the soundtrack and scoring; some moments working wonderfully with the non-diegetic sound (hello film studies!), whereas some songs being jarring and near distracting for me. Aside from these issues though, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 goes down into the Hollywood book of “Exceptions to the Sequel-itus Rule” (basically my way of saying it’s better than the first), jam packed full of more easter eggs than… er… Tesco shelves around this time of year (listen out for Peter’s ringtone). While it’s somewhat uneven in pace and feels like more of a franchise building block at times (it puts firmly to bed any hope of Spider-Man appearing in the Marvel Cinematic Universe), it’s an enjoyable super-romp in the company of Peter Parker.

*NOTE: This is a joke, believe it or not. A commenter on my Noah review mistakenly thought I genuinely believed that Noah was based on Evan Almighty, so I thought I’d flag up that I’m not that much of a berk.