Film Shapes

I saw this confronting 2004 drama at the German Film Festival as part of a retrospective of Fatih Akin films. Unfortunately, there was only one screening in Perth, there might be extra shows in other cities. Akin's a great stylist, authentic and functional, and his films are informed by his cultural standing as a German-Turkish writer/director. In this film, a rough looking bloke called Cahit (Birol Ünel) smashes his car - head-on - into a wall after a heavy night on the turps. While getting treatment, he meets Sibel (Sibel Kekilli), a young woman who recognises his shared dual nationality status. She's looking for a 'Turkish' guy to marry, so her parents will get off her back. Initially sceptical and aggressively dismissive, Cahit realises Sibel is dangerously desperate, so he agrees to the sham marriage. There's an early bump in the road when Cahit kicks Sibel out on their wedding night for asking about his dead wife. Soon enough though, things settle into a room...

This is the second film I've seen in a row where two blokes wrote the film and also starred in it ( see previous review ). This time round the two blokes are Michael Angelo Covino (also directing) and Kyle Marvin. The coup was signing Dakota Johnson and Adria Arjona to play the wives, Julie and Ashley. On the face of it, it's hard to believe that these women would be with these two spuds, but the script allows for a suspension of disbelief. Marvin plays Carey, just over a year into marriage with Ashley (Arjona). On the way to a waterfront weekend with Paul and Julie (Covino and Johnson), Ashley explains that she wants a divorce. The trigger may have had something to do with them being part of a road accident death, a darkly amusing opening scene. Carey leaves the car in a panic and eventually finds his way to the beach house. Distraught, he decides to wallow with his friends until a discretion threatens to blow apart the relationship. To be clear, Julie and Paul's open rela...

The Guardian recently ran an article on the ten best World War II films, as voted by respondents to a Deltapoll for The War Movie Theatre podcast (see their list and link at the end of this piece). As this year is 80 years since the end of hostilities, I thought it might be interesting to run down my top twenty World War II films. Here we go: 20.  Empire of the Sun   (Steven Spielberg - 1987)  This China-set drama of expats during the war in the Pacific theatre was Christian Bale's first big role at the age of 13. He's pretty bloody good too, as are most of the cast, including John Malkovich and Nigel Havers. Spielberg saw this J.G. Ballard story as a chance to make a comparatively 'darker' film about the loss of innocence and it turned out to be one of his very best. 19.  The English Patient   (Anthony Minghella - 1996)  All the press for this film was the love story angle between dreamy Ralph Fiennes (pre-Voldemort, of course) and elegantly icy Kristin Sc...

Ho ho, yo yos. Here's my rundown of films in 2024. By my best count I saw 124 films last year, 115 of them new watches (though not necessarily made or released in 2024), and 61 of them at the cinema. Of those cinema trips, 28 were at Luna Leederville , 14 at Palace Raine Square and 10 at the Backlot Perth , with 6 other cinemas making up the numbers. So here are my 10 favourite films from 2024, with a top 5 pod down the bottom... [Click on the titles for links to full reviews] 10. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024) George Miller's follow-up to Fury Road tells us the story of how Furiosa got to where that film started. I reckon this was the best blockbuster of the year, certainly the most entertaining, with one epic action sequence and a couple of fine performances from Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth. Great fun. 9. The Taste of Things (2023) Don't go in hungry! This is a foodie's shan-grill-ah, the high culinary masterwork of the last decade or more. Juliette Binoch...

This is an oddly constructed reincarnation AI romance film (you probably won't hear that every day). Based loosely on the Henry James novella, The Beast in the Jungle , director Bertrand Bonello sets our present in 2044 where Gabrielle (Léa Seydoux) must decide between getting a better job or keeping her emotions. You see, Artificial Intelligence has saved humanity from an unnamed disaster and is now running things, perfectly but dispassionately. The offer to 'clean her DNA' would remove her 'affects', or memories, thus enabling her to undertake work tasks logically, free of emotional influence. Through this process we see two earlier incarnations of Gabrielle - in 1910 Paris, and 2014 Los Angeles. In a none too subtle hint early on, Gabrielle mentions to someone that she doesn't want to become a Buddhist - maybe she had no choice, as it appears her DNA is 'remembering' things and carrying her experiences through time. Seydoux shimmers in each time perio...

Prolific writer/director, Alice Rohrwacher brings us this 1980s-set tale of a gang of Tombaroli, petty crims who steal artefacts from Etruscan tombs to sell on the black market. Their nominal leader, Arthur, returns to his shack, barnacled onto the side of an imposing castle city somewhere Tuscany. He has been 'away' and clearly has the major hump, if his reactions to his old crew have any bearing. The one person he wants to see is Flora, the mother of his absent girlfriend. It's in this run-down mansion that we meet, Italia, a slightly hesitant, slightly careless music student of Flora. So far, so good, but after this promising start, the films sadly peters out a bit. Josh O'Connor plays Arthur, an Englishman with a talent for dowsing archaeological sites, and he's asked to pull miserable for most of the journey. There's not much else to him and this lack of range doesn't help the film as a whole, unfortunately. Isabella Rossellini, on the other hand is fan...

This delicacy, directed by Tran Ahn Hung, is France's entry for best foreign language film for this year's Oscars. And it has a good shot at winning too. Disregard the awful English title - it's called La Passion de Dodin Bouffant in French - and prepare yourself for some of the most lovingly presented images imaginable.  There's an amazing extended opening that captures activity in a rustic 19th century kitchen. Eugénie (the ageless Juliette Binoche) and Dodin (Benoît Magimel) are cook and gourmet of the manor. He's smitten, has been for 20 years, but it seems Eugénie wants to keep things professional. Clearly, without her skills to complement his, he wouldn't be known as 'the Napoleon of Gastronomy'. This is only Tran's fourth film in 23 years, since he hit his peak in 2000 with The Vertical Ray of the Sun . Like that work of art, The Taste of Things is incredibly lush and evocative. Cinematographer Jonathan Ricquebourg's camera hovers throug...

This film is proof that the romantic comedy genre doesn't always need to be insufferable Hollywood shite, if indeed The Innocent can even be classified as a rom-com. It's about a young bloke, his best friend, his mum and her new hubby. There's pathos, mild threat, humour and romance, all balanced and pitched just about right.  Director and co-writer, Louis Garrel also stars as Abel, widower and perhaps the innocent of the title. His best friend (and also best friend of his late wife) is Clémence, played by a stellar Noémie Merlant, and while their relationship is a potential for juice, the story actually revolves around Abel's mum's new partner, and his status as an ex-con. Mum Sylvie (Anouk Grinberg) teaches theatre in prisons, where she has met and fallen in love with Michel (Roschdy Zem), and upon his release - they've said the vows in prison - they start a new life, and business together. Abel, meanwhile, doesn't trust Michel and therefore starts tailin...

Summerland is a romantic drama from Jessica Swale set on the English coast during World War 2. Gemma Arterton plays a cantankerous young writer, who investigates myths and superstitions. A young lad is billeted to stay at her cottage during the blitz (unbeknownst to her) and herein begins the drama. The central phenomenon in the film is a commonly occurring sighting known as the Fata Morgana , a kind of mirage where people have claimed to have seen castles, cities, all sorts of junk, usually from a coastline. Arterton's character, Alice, is looking into these mirages when Frank, un-irritatingly played by Lucas Bond, comes to stay. The title refers to the pagan idea of the afterlife - The Summerland. Alice's scientific, logical approach to life chafes slightly against Frank's childish beliefs but the film doesn't make any grand statements. Rather it seems to suggest that seeing things (or believing things) is a personal choice and this needn't interfere with other s...

June 1st. Cheap tickets day at HAT 109. I was hopeful about this film, but also a little wary. As it turned out, both preconceptions were met. I liked parts of it a lot and hated parts in equal measure. Positives first. Matt Damon is a really likeable figure on screen (off it as well, so I hear) and his acting is improving with age, rather like Di Caprio. His partnership with Emily Blunt works very well here - she's great too. The story is based on a Phillip K. Dick novella, and it has a certain nutty charm, reminiscent of an old episode of The Twilight Zone TV show. Some of the set-pieces come off (a couple of chase scenes on foot in particular) but the theme of the film is where the worms come out. Right off the bat, let me say I can't stand religious propaganda in films. Religion, as a plot point, a theme or even an incidental garnish to a story are all fine with me, but I can't abide the sly stuff (and this is mostly perpetrated by Hollywood). The Adjustment Bu...