Before the Devil Knows You're Dead - 26/03/07 - *****

Review of the Film Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (15)

Warning: this review contains some plot spoilers. The rating is out of five stars.

In a word, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is an intense film. I can’t remember the last time that I actually found myself struggling to watch what was happening on screen, and not because of any excessive blood, gore, or other ‘pornographic’ content. The drama, tension, and the suffering of the main characters is so great, and the heat and pressing nature of their constantly multiplying dilemmas just don’t let up, not even for a second; and when there’s the slightest whiff of a more positive ending to a particular plot thread, that plot thread is cut off and left where it is. Basically, do not watch this film if you want to relax or are feeling in any way depressed or suicidal! If you are wanting to relax, or are depressed/suicidal though, find a way to snap out of it quickly… and watch this film in the next one hundred and seventeen minutes that you have free. Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is a thoroughly captivating film told with such classy professionalism that it’s few pitfalls can be forgiven in almost an instant, because of it’s unrelenting bounty of mesmerising intellect stimulating sequences!

From the off, we are told in no unclear terms that this isn’t going to be an easy ride. The very first scene is a rather startling and sobering sex scene, far more graphic and lengthy than your average such scene in most of today’s at least relatively mainstream films. Any feelings of being comfortable or thinking that you know what to expect are instantly shattered by this quite jarring and seemingly unnecessarily drawn out opening scene. But, it’s purpose I believe, justifying it’s graphic and ‘long’, duration-wise nature, is as I have described. To get us in the mood…

This film definitely doesn’t want to leave it’s audience feeling like it’s had a good time, it does not want to please you or entertain you in any way that your average cinema fodder might settle to do. But please, please please do not take that as a warning not to see the film… I’ve said it already but I’m going to say it again even more unambiguously! See this film, now…!

I do not want to destroy the delicate experience that the film creates for the viewer, a web of pain, a tale of how different people deal with crazily pressured situations, and so I will just give you this brief and decently plot spoiler free outline of what the film is about in basic story terms: two estranged brothers attempt to rob their parents suburban jewellery store… and things just don’t go to plan one little bit.

I am not yet very familiar with the work of this film’s famous director, Sidney Lumet. There are a few of his films that I have been wanting to see for a very long time, and now I shall be prioritising them even more. This is definitely a director who’s work it is worth looking into. Do it!

One of the main highlights of this film from a less story-based aspect, is the acting. Philip Seymour Hoffman has instantly gone from being ‘one’ of the best actors working today in my mind, to possibly the very best currently working out there anywhere in the world. He is such a recognisable actor yet he still manages to become so vividly and totally the characters who he is portraying, and in this film he plays a character who I haven’t seen him play anything very much like before I don’t think, and I really was way beyond the point of thinking to myself, “I’m watching Philip Seymour Hoffman on the big screen here, my isn’t he good…” He is his characters. …And if he ever plays another one like this he may just a have a genuine heart attack on camera and die… No, not in a bizarre display of extreme dedication to method acting, but out sheer failing to be able any longer to keep from buckling under the strain of living the woes and fears of another person not even himself, for the sake of art! When you see this man screaming and crying on screen, it chokes you up; end of story.

Of course the other actors, including Ethan Hawke, Albert Finney and Marisa Tomei must get their special mentions, but in the light of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s bright and shining star it is a little hard to concentrate on thinking of ways to describe their also excellent talents in quite the same way. Suffice to say though, they are all more than worth watching. If all of the acting quality that this film displays were divided between all of the other films released on the main circuit in an average year, then it wouldn’t be so easy to guess who’s getting what in the acting categories at Oscar time!

The performers are all helped enormously by the truly great script writing that has gone into this film, and much credit must go to Kelly Masterson, who’s debut screenplay this film was shot from.

I mentioned earlier about some pitfalls that this film understandably does have; I say understandably because this is not a film crafted by God himself, and so is therefore open to the possibility of not being entirely one hundred percent perfect. The main things I will say, if they can really be called main things on account of their being such small problems to begin with, are some pacing issues and editing quibbles mainly around the mid, leaning towards end section of Before the Devil Knows You‘re Dead. A few scenes feel just a little too long and slow for I’m sure some people’s tastes, but their quietness and stillness in the dark light of all that is going on contributes massively the films taut and demonic atmosphere. Also, the films clever way of unfolding the plot in a non-chronological bit by bit format, tying up loose ends here and there and explaining what led to what and so on, does by about three quarters of the way through the picture begin to feel maybe a little too clever for it’s own good; perhaps a few segments could have been combined into one instead of being placed at opposite end of the film’s running time; and finally, by certain points in the film the cruelty of the writer to his own characters seems to become a little like adding insult to injury… but really, these are extremely minor gripes indeed that most people would probably believe are best left ignored, as they are equivalent to particularly small black spots on the sun, and who can’t see the sun for the black spots on it…?

So, that is all; see the film, if you think that you're mind is up to it.

Rating : *****

Written by,

.Peter.D.Marsay.

Originally completed: 26/03/08.
Updated: 28/03/08.

Cloverfield - 03/02/07 - *****

Review of the Film Cloverfield (15).

Warning: this review contains some plot spoilers. The rating is out of five stars.

I have not yet seen the similarly filmed motion picture The Blair Witch Project, and how similar the two films are in style I do not know… but whatever the case, I have never seen anything like Cloverfield. I haven’t been so thoroughly ‘in to’ a film at the cinema for a long long time; much of the film caused me to make use only of the edge of the seat that I had paid for, and if you could have seen my face during most of it then I would probably have appeared to you like some kind of demented and euphoric drug addict. So intensely thrilling were many scenes that I couldn’t help but grin from ear to ear, making my cheeks begin to cramp. The handheld style of shooting makes the film so immersive that at times I could almost genuinely feel the fear that the characters were feeling, and feel as though I was an invisible companion of theirs. The tension is so nerve-racking so that watching Cloverfield must be at least as good for your heart as taking a brisk walk supposedly is. The film really flies past, not just because it runs for only eighty-five minutes, but because it is so thoroughly exciting!

The format in which the story is told is that the film that we are seeing is merely amateur video footage discovered by the military in an area of Manhattan ‘formerly known as Central Park’… Said story is about a group of young New York city-slickers having their goodbye party for one of their number, (the lead character Rob Hawkins,) rudely interrupted by some kind of Godzilla-like monster attacking the city! What a wonderful recipe for fun. The country to which Rob was planning on moving to is Japan, and I think that that is a very appropriate nod of thanks by Drew Goddard the scriptwriter to the country from which the character of Godzilla first originated. Another interesting reference (of a kind) to the original Japanese Godzilla film Gojira (1954), is that in that film Godzilla is caused to appear and attack Japan by American nuclear weapons testing, whereas in this film it is hinted (very subtly indeed…) that the monster was caused to appear by a falling Japanese satellite… see if you can spot the clue (and then look it up online) in the very last shot of the film. So originally, America caused the monster to attack Japan, but now Japan causes it to attack America. See?

The actions of the creature and the way in which the authorities attempt to handle the situation are done so convincingly that you really forget that the premise of a skyscraper sized monster rampaging through a city is really a very fantastical idea, and together with the ‘it’s all real’ approach of the handheld camera work supposedly shot by one of the main characters, creates such a convincing level of virtual reality that surely couldn’t have been any better unless the film was shot in 3D, but that wouldn’t have fitted with the film’s concept because there aren’t yet any video cameras available on the market that can shoot in 3D.

Cloverfield works almost perfectly as a horror/adventure film, and I dare you not to be thoroughly impressed by the bold ending; but it does, naturally, have it’s flaws. The main problem is the horribly stupid and annoying main characters! To put a good spin on it, perhaps the filmmakers wanted that to be so in order to make the film more believable and realistic, but at times I just wanted to shout at them to get on with it or to wake up! So, the lead characters are a bunch of dumb rich kids, but their reactions and decisions and so forth are believable enough, and the performances of the actors more than sincere enough to make this a sufficiently glazed over flaw to render it not too big a problem in the overall scheme of things. Aside from that, the only other slight weakness that I noticed are a couple of rather too obviously set-up scenarios, in the sense that they are obviously done to produce the most drawn out feelings of shock and horror in the audience as possible. But this is also forgivable, as in the end theses scenarios are executed by the director Matt Reeves, (and of course the editor Kevin Stitt,) in an extremely taut and urgent fashion meaning that you won’t have time think too much about what you know is going to happen. Another thing which makes this more forgivable is that towards the end and probably even as it progresses throughout most if not all of it’s running time, the film becomes less and less predictable, building to a quality finale that is both frantic and chaotic in all the right ways. I did think that perhaps it should have ended a few minutes earlier than it did, at what seemed to be a very appropriate point to me, but I can see that the filmmakers needed to give the main character’s stories a little more closure so as not to jar the unprepared audience too much, although perhaps this was at the expense of even greater realism and, as you will see, the overall effectiveness of the monster. The ending as it stands and the ending as it could have been both have good arguments for and against them, so this is not really a solid gripe to have with the film.

I cannot finish this review without mentioning producer J.J. Abrams, without whom this refreshing and absolutely essential film would never have come to be… and I can certainly say that I am more than looking forward to his franchise restarting film Star Trek, being released on boxing day, which he is both co-producing and directing… probably shooting even as I write! Much of the credit must go to him for giving Cloverfield such quality even on the relatively of minuscule budget of thirty million Dollars… which is for example ten times less than that of the recent film Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, which made less money on it’s opening weekend at the box office in the U.S. than this did; Cloverfield made back more than one and a half times it’s budget on it’s U.S. opening weekend alone!

There is plenty to stay for during the end credits, including the film's only musical score which is absolutely brilliant and will make you tingle. It serves as another nice and appropriate reminder of past science fiction B-pictures; not that Cloverfield is a B Picture, despite it's low budget. Beyond that though and more importantly there is something else to be heard right at the very end of the closing credits... and once you have heard it you'll need to look it up online to discover it's full meaning as I am not going to spoil it for you here! Now, a little warning if you are (as you should be...) planning on going to see this film: if you suffer from motion sickness, take something for it beforehand, and if you have epilepsy or perhaps even just a history of it, then you would probably be wise to give this film a miss… Flashing light effects and shaky, (more like wave all over the place-y…) camera work is the reason for that. It would be a shame though, because given the truly excellent nature of the film you would be really missing out on something very special.

Rating : *****

Written by,

.Peter.D.Marsay.

Originally completed: 03/02/08.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) - 27/01/08 - *****

Review of the Film Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) (18).

Warning: this review contains some plot spoilers. The rating is out of five stars.

Tim Burton’s long awaited bloodthirsty musical does all but disappoint the legions that have been looking forward to it’s release. Anyone doubting the singing abilities of the leads Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter will be very pleasantly surprised within the opening few minutes…

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) is about human nature; and it makes a very bold statement about the truth of that, which I am sure many people who see the film will either just subconsciously ignore, or be so repulsed by the notion of admitting it that they will form an unchangeably negative opinion of the film. That point, which the film makes all too well, is that the apparently wicked and twisted Todd himself is in fact the one person in the story who has even the slightest inkling as what humanity really deserves. Death, suffering and painful slaughter… and for anyone to deny that is one of the very most incredibly and disgustingly pompous expressions of self-inflicted moral blindness possible. A lot of people are finding this film very enjoyable and even saying that it is one of their all time favourites, but I suspect that they can surely not be seeing the ultimate point of the tale for this reason. Of course there is much else to ‘like’ about the film other than the expert way that it makes it’s taboo point, such as the breathtakingly charismatic turns given by the two popular lead actors, Johnny Depp who has been nominated for an Oscar as Sweeney Todd, who’s best friends are his silver handled razor blades, and Helena Bonham Carter who plays Mrs. Lovett, Todd's sexually charged landlady and the creator of the worst pies in London… Also the Oscar nominated, inspiringly gloomy art direction is really something to behold, which along with the fittingly demented cinematography makes Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) a truly unique visual experience. Of course though, it is the magnificently electrifying music and lyrics by the legendary Stephen Sondheim that makes the film what is, and the full soundtrack CD has gone straight onto my own personal wish list!

The film is definitely not flawless though. I can’t quite put my finger on the reason for it, but I found myself struggling to become enough emotionally connected with the characters to really feel their pain, unlike in many other truly great films… perhaps it’s because I was reacting to the story in a way that wasn’t quite as expected by the filmmakers, as the message of humankind's deserving of suffering and damnation was so plain to me unlike it probably was to most people, but I’m not at all sure and will have to think about that more on my second viewing. That I’ll be seeing the film again though says a lot, and this is a masterpiece by Tim Burton… it’s cynical and truly insane, but it is a real masterwork.

It will probably be confusing to a lot of cinema goers whether or not they are supposed to sympathise with Sweeney, and I think that the film creates the right balance in his character of portraying the truth of his motives, along with the inappropriateness, impracticality and ultimately pointless nature of his actions. The fact that so many of his victims seem to go totally unmissed is quite saddening but also very eye-opening… it puts to bed the idea of a single human life having any say in the ultimate scheme of things, which is powerfully reflected in Sweeney’s own final fate. He realised the truth of the problem, but found the wrong solution and so was left as if in a boat with one paddle… and he ends up in an even worse place than when he first begun.

On another note, don’t believe everything you’ve heard about the unparalleled levels of blood and gore in the film, making even Saw (2004) look like Toy Story (1995) … it’s just not true. There is actually very little ‘gore’ as such, and although there is quite a lot of blood squirting around at various stages, on the whole it is not on a level that most people won’t have seen before. What I will say though is that unlike with a lot of films, the camera doesn’t turn away and/or the shot doesn’t cut away at the ‘moment of impact’. In my opinion that is a much more honest way to depict violence, especially in a story like this. There are many films out there with stories featuring much more violence than this, but in which we aren’t actually shown anything more than the build up to a violent act, followed by the effect of it… with the ‘moment of impact’ completely omitted. That can be far more desensitising and unhealthy to watch I think than the way that the violence is shown here.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) is a tragic and soulful film, but more importantly it is also extremely refreshing and bracingly non-single-minded, so that the bleakness of it does not darken your outlook on life, but in fact opens new doors of opportunity for the viewer who truly watched it with their eyes wide open! What you should go away with after seeing it is this: we all deserve to die… murder is not the answer. So what is…?

Rating : *****

Written by,

.Peter.D.Marsay.

Originally completed: 27/01/08.