Roy Miller (Matt Damon)

After making the final two thirds of the outstanding international thriller/action Bourne franchise together, director Paul Greengrass and actor Matt Damon have teamed up again for Green Zone. Set in the early days of the 2003 Iraq War, Damon plays US Army Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller who is deployed in Baghdad to find the Weapons of Mass Destruction that the allies gave as their reason to invade Iraq. After repeatedly coming up empty-handed Miller starts to question the reliability of the military intelligence his team is being fed. What unfolds plays out like a conspiracy thriller where the audience already know what Miller does not – there are no WMDs in Iraq but there are many powerful interests invested in the belief that there are.

Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear) and Roy Miller (Matt Damon)

Of all the previous films made about the 2003 Iraq War, Green Zone has the most in common with Nick Broomfield’s Battle for Haditha (2007). Both films use handheld cameras to create a cinéma vérité style of cinematography that makes what is on-screen appear to be raw footage filmed by a cameraperson who was on the ground and amid the action. Both films are also critical of the American involvement in Iraq, however, Green Zone doesn’t demonise all the Americans and instead champions righteous characters such as Miller and CIA man Martin Brown (Brendan Glesson) who come up against self-serving characters such as Defence Intelligence agent Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear).

Likewise, the Iraqi characters are not just viewed as the enemy or as victims and the character of Freddy (Khalid Abdalla from The Kite Runner) is used very effectively to represent the everyday people of Baghdad who want an end to the violence and oppression in their country. None of the characters in Green Zone are particularly complex in their own right but together they represent a broad range of view-points that situates Green Zone neatly between Brian De Palma’s overly didactic Redacted (2007) and Kathryn Bigelow’s apolitical The Hurt Locker (2008).

However, the main appeal of Green Zone is Greengrass’s approach to filming action, which he developed covering global conflicts for television. Instead of blocking the action for the camera frame, Greengrass allows the action to unfold while the camera must simply keep up. The result is a camera that is constantly moving, which increases during the really adrenin-pumping scenes to reach an exhilarating crescendo in the film’s climatic gunfight/chase sequence. Unlike the rapid editing of composed shots in the films of directors such as Michael Bay, with Greengrass you never feel as if you are missing any of the important details about what is going on within all the chaos on screen.

Green Zone continues Greengrass and Damon’s collaboration on making action films for the ‘thinking person’. This time they are also using the action genre to set the record straight by reminding audiences that despite the rhetoric that has since come out, the rationale behind invading Iraq was based on highly dubious information that Iraq was stockpiling WMDs.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

The Hurt Locker

There were very few surprises this year at the Oscars and I was able to correctly predict 12 out of the 20 awards. Although Avatar is still my preferred film of all the films nominated it is very hard to begrudge The Hurt Locker cleaning up, including winning the Best Motion Picture and Best Director awards. Those two awards finally recognise director Kathryn Bigelow’s incredible talent as a filmmaker, not to mention making her the first Oscar-winning female director.

I felt that the rest of the awards all seemed mostly deserved or justified with the exception of The Young Victoria winning Best Costume Design and Sandra Bullock winning Best Actress for The Blind Side. However, in both cases the acceptance speeches won me over and I stopped grumbling. Despite her bizarrely ungracious attitude, Best Costume Design award winner Sandy Powell expressed my frustrations that period films like The Young Victoria usually win such awards while smaller films that are not about “dead monarchs or glittery musicals” get overlooked.

Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side

I’ve never had anything against Sandra Bullock (despite disliking so many of her films) but I really didn’t want her to win Best Actress mainly because I reacted so badly to The Blind Side. However, Bullock’s acceptance speech was generous, heartfelt, humble and funny so I think she earned herself a lot of credibility in that moment. I do believe that newcomers Carey Mulligan in An Education and Gabourey Sidibe in Precious were nevertheless more deserving but they’ll have lots more shots at the award in the future.

As for the actual ceremony, there was a sincere and moving tribute to the late John Hughes, there was a pretty good attempt and demonstrating what sound editing and sound mixing actually are and Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin provided more laughs  as hosts than It’s Complicated did in its entirety. It was actually a really enjoyable ceremony and the only dud aspect was that there was no time for a clip montage of cinematography nominees or for each nominated  Best Original Song to be played but there was apparently time for an interpretative dance routine to each piece of music nominated for Best Musical Score.

Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart

On a final note, how great was it to see Jeff Bridges win Best Actor for Crazy Heart and then do that speech where he sounded like he was going to suddenly transform into The Dude in front of our eyes?

There’s a full list of all the winners on the official Oscars website.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

I’m not going to comment on the any of the documentary or short film categories as I haven’t seen the majority of the films nominated but I will share my thoughts and predictions about the feature films up for various awards. Alternatively you can go straight to my ranked list of all the nominated films or the list of my predictions.

Best Motion Picture and Best Director

The Hurt Locker

The big story this year is that the two favourite films, Avatar and The Hurt Locker, are respectively by action film maestros James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow, who used to have a professional and a personal relationship (they were married). Bigelow seems to be preferred mainly because Cameron won in a big way previously with Titanic (1997) and was kind of obnoxious about it while Bigelow has been previously ignored by the Academy.

The Academy frequently rights past wrongs by awarding people for less deserving films to make up for previous oversights and there is a good chance that will happen this year to Bigelow. The Hurt Locker is certainly a very good film but it is not a good as many of Bigelow’s previous films including Near Dark (1987), Blue Steel (1989) and Strange Days (1995). A lot of people are also excited about the gritty realism that Bigelow brings to the Iraq conflict but I can only explain that by assuming that they haven’t seen Nick Broomfield’s Battle for Haditha (2007) and are yet to see Paul Greengrass’s Green Zone (2010), both of which are superior films.

However, I still think Avatar is going to win the main prize and honestly that would suit me just fine. I’m rarely one to back the big, bloated, over-exposed Hollywood eye-candy film but of all the films nominated this year I truly think Avatar is overall the film that deserves to win. As I discussed in my original review and the subsequent occasionally heated comments, Avatar may have its flaws but it is such a technological achievement and such an immersive experience that it completely won me over. It certainly deals with archetypal characters and re-hashes a very familiar story rather than going for anything resembling narrative originality but I firmly believe that there is an art to repackaging a well-worn tale and making it something exciting again. Avatar over-exceeds  expectations and not many films can make that claim.

Acting awards

Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds

Jeff Bridges seems destined to win Best Actor for his performance in Crazy Heart and so he should as his role in the film is one that he’s been building up to for his entire career. While many people are betting on Sandra Bullock winning Best Actress for The Blind Side, and she is the best thing about this loathsome film, I think the charm, freshness and non-rampant conservatism of Carey Mulligan’s performance in An Education may in the end win over the Academy’s voting members. I certainly hope so anyway but I suspect I am being naive. Christoph Waltz should and will win Best Supporting Actor for Inglourious Basterds and Mo’Nique should and will win Best Supporting Actress in Precious.

Writing awards

For the screenplay awards I’m pretty certain that the very good yet  middle-of-the-road Up in the Air will win Best Adapted Screenplay while Best Original Screenplay will go to The Hurt Locker. However, I’d much rather see the political and poetically profane In the Loop win for Best Adapted while the tightly written animation Up should really win for Best Original.

Technical awards

The White Ribbon

If Avatar does indeed win Best Motion Picture then I’m certain the Academy will compensate by not only giving The Hurt Locker Best Director but a bunch of other awards including Cinematography, Editing, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing. However, editing should go to District 9 for its seamless blend of cinematic styles while cinematography should go to Christian Berger’s incredible work in The White Ribbon. In fact, The White Ribbon is one of the most perfectly shot films ever made so I do hope the Academy prove me wrong and recognise its achievement in the cinematography category.

Production award

My pet hate with all film awards is that Best Art Direction and Best Costumes usually always go to whatever film was set the furthest in the past. Recreating historical details is always deemed more worthy that actually using art direction and costumes to reflect character or themes in a filmic way. So even though I haven’t seen The Young Victoria I’m sure it will win Best Art Direction while the visually bold, inventive and exhilarating The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus will miss out. In most other years I’d tip The Young Victoria to win Best Costumes too but I’m pretty sure that Coco avant Chanel will win because it’s about a fashion designer and the Academy are just so crushingly obvious like that sometimes.

Others

Avatar

Up, of course, will deservedly win Best Animated Film and the massively acclaimed A Prophet will win Best Foreign Language Film. Original score will go to Avatar and it would be very embarrassing if any song other than “The Weary Kind” from Crazy Heart won Best Original Song. Star Trek may as well take Best Make Up and as for Best Visual Effects … well, I can’t imagine even the most ferociously anti-Avatar critic thinking it won’t and doesn’t deserve to win for this one.

✭✭✭✭✩
Avatar (James Cameron, 2009) 9 nominations
Up (Pete Docter, 2009) 5 nominations
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Terry Gilliam, 2009) 2 nominations

✭✭✭✭
District 9 (Neill Blomkamp, 2009) 4 nominations
Crazy Heart (Scott Cooper, 2009) 3 nominations
Bright Star (Jane Campion, 2009) 1 nomination
A Prophet (Un prophète, Jacques Audiard, 2009) 1 nomination
A Serious Man (Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, 2009) 2 nominations
An Education (Lone Scherfig, 2009) 3 nominations
In the Loop (Armando Iannucci, 2009) 1 nomination
Star Trek (J.J. Abrams, 2009) 4 nomination
The Princess and the Frog (Ron Clements and John Musker, 2009) 3 nominations

✭✭✭✩
The White Ribbon (Das weiße Band, Michael Haneke, 2009) 2 nominations
The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow, 2008) 9 nominations
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino, 2009) 8 nominations
A Single Man (Tom Ford, 2009) 1 nomination
Precious (Lee Daniels, 2009) 6 nominations
Up in the Air (Jason Reitman, 2009) 6 nominations
Julie & Julia (Nora Ephron, 2009) 1 nomination
Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson, 2009) 2 nominations
Invictus (Clint Eastwood, 2009) 2 nomination
Coraline (Henry Selick, 2009) 1 nomination

✭✭✭
Coco avant Chanel (Anne Fontaine, 2009) 1 nomination
Sherlock Holmes (Guy Ritchie, 2009) 2 nominations
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (David Yates, 2009) 1 nomination

✭✭✩
Nine (Rob Marshall, 2009) 4 nominations
The Last Station (Michael Hoffman, 2009) 2 nomination

✭✭
The Lovely Bones (Peter Jackson, 2009) 1 nomination

✭✩
The Blind Side (John Lee Hancock, 2009) 2 nominations
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay, 2009) 1 nomination

Not seen
Ajami (Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani, 2009) 1 nomination
Il Divo (Paolo Sorrentino, 2008) 1 nomination
The Messenger (Oren Moverman, 2009) 2 nominations
The Milk of Sorrow (La teta asustada, Claudia Llosa, 2009) 1 nomination
Paris 36 (Faubourg 36, Christophe Barratier, 2008) 1 nomination
The Secret in Their Eyes (El secreto de sus ojos, Juan José Campanella, 2009) 1 nomination
The Secret of Kells (Tomm Moore, 2009) 1 nomination
The Young Victoria (Jean-Marc Vallée, 2009) 3 nominations

A full list of all the nominees can be found on the official Oscars website and I’m sure several thousand websites and blogs elsewhere. Here are my predictions in one straightforward list:

Best Motion Picture: Avatar (James Cameron and Jon Land)

Directing: The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow)

Actor in a Leading Role: Crazy Heart (Jeff Bridges)

Actress in a Leading Role: An Education (Carey Mulligan)

Actor in a Supporting Role: Inglourious Basterds (Christoph Waltz)

Actress in a Supporting Role: Precious (Mo’Noque)

Writing (Adapted Screenplay): Up in the Air (Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner)

Writing (Original Screenplay): The Hurt Locker (Mark Boal)

Cinematography: The Hurt Locker (Barry Ackroyd)

Film Editing: The Hurt Locker (Bob Murawski and Chris Innis)

Sound Editing: The Hurt Locker (Paul N.J. Ottosson)

Sound Mixing: The Hurt Locker (Paul N.J. Ottosson and Ray Beckett)

Art Direction: The Young Victoria (Patrice Vermette and Maggie Gray)

Costume Design: Coco avant Chanel (Catherine Leterrier)

Animated Feature Film: Up (Pete Docter)

Foreign Language Film: A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)

Music (Original Score): Avatar (James Horner)

Music (Original Song): Crazy Heart (“The Weary Kind” by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett)

Makeup: Star Trek (Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow)

Visual Effects: Avatar (Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R. Jones)

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Alice (Mia Wasikowska)

The first thing you need to know about Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland is that despite its title implying that it is a new adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s much-loved 19^th century novels Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, it is in fact a sequel. In Burton’s film Alice is now a 19-year-old girl who has forgotten about her childhood journey into Underland (she misheard it as ‘Wonderland’) and once more takes a trip down the rabbit-hole after ducking out on an engagement proposal that has been carefully arranged for her. Having now returned to the magical world that she thought was something she dreamt, Alice is given the mission of saving the Underland inhabitants from the tyrannical rule of the Red Queen. Such a film really should have instead be called something like Return to Wonderland or Wonderland III: Wonder Harder.

The Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp)

The main problem with Burton’s film is that there is too much story when there should have been very little. While Carroll’s original novels and most other adaptations were absurdist, fragmented stories with Alice encountering one strange situation after another, Burton’s film introduces the majority of the characters within the first 10 minutes of Alice arriving in Underland. Burton has assumed, maybe correctly, that characters such as the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat and Tweedledee and Tweedledum are iconic enough to not warrant separate introductions but the joy of Lewis’s novels is Alice’s progression from one character to another.

Burton’s film resembles fan-fiction where Alice, with the help of her Underland friends, is sent on a quest that involves finding her inner strength. The result feels like a mash up of The Wizard of Oz and The Lord of the Rings, which may have been OK if it didn’t feel so out of synch with the original spirit of Carroll’s novels.

Australian actor Mia Wasikowska does a decent job at embodying Burton’s classic outsider/loner persona in the character of Alice. However, despite the film depicting her imagination and freewill as being under threat by the social conventions of Victorian society, by fulfilling a pre-ordained in Underland she is simply playing yet another role that she didn’t choose herself.

The Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter)

Johnny Depp is enjoyable as always but on complete autopilot as The Mad Hatter flickering between the manic, dark and vulnerable states that he has perfected from working with Burton for so long. Likewise, Burton’s other regular performer (and wife) Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen simply feels like a lesser version of Queen ‘Queenie’ Elizabeth I from Blackadder II.

Nevertheless, to dismiss Burton’s Alice in Wonderland altogether would do a considerable disservice to the remarkable visual achievements that makes such a film still worth seeing on the big screen despite all its faults. The moment when Alice does fall down the rabbit-hole and then emerge into Underland is glorious with Danny Elfman’s distinct score resonating on the soundtrack and Burton’s surreal gothic sensibility in full force, combining the aesthetics that audiences have come to love from films such as Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow and Big Fish. The narrative may be forced and uninteresting but the combination of costuming, art direction, production design and cinematography compensate. You’re not going to lose yourself in the story or the characters but visually Alice in Wonderland is a series of moving artworks that are a joy to gaze upon despite lacking any depth, even in 3D.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges)

Former country music star Bad Blake is a character who is living the sort of life that is so often sung about in his chosen music genre. He’s 57, doing third-rate gigs, smoking too much, drinking too much and basically all washed up. While his former protégée Tommy Sweet has vastly overtaken him professionally Bad barely keeps it together by rehashing old songs from his back catalogue to his small, aging but still devoted fans scattered around country USA. Crazy Heart initially evokes Bruce Beresford’s 1983 Tender Mercies due to the strong similarities between the settings and the films’ leading characters but it is a superior film.

Jeff Bridges gives the performance of his career as Bad. It’s a part that Bridges has been building up to for years while playing various down-and-out heroes and indeed Bad Blake is not too dissimilar to the jazz pianist character he played in the The Fabulous Baker Boys. Such a character could easily be dislikeable but Bridges gives him a cranky charm and sweet sadness. He is frazzled, lives like a slob and very grumpy but the shine in Bridge’s eyes and the cracks in his voice make us love him.

Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges) and Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal)

The entire cast of Crazy Heart is excellent including Colin Farrell as Tommy Sweet and Robert Duvall as Bad’s old friend Wayne. Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Jean, a young divorcee who comes into Bad’s life, and it is wonderful to see a strong female character that is allowed to be both emotional and resilient. The development of Bad and Jean’s relationship is one of the many aspects of Crazy Heart that feels incredibly sincere and genuine. Rather than adhering to the sort of classical Hollywood narrative structure that we are accustomed to seeing in such films, Crazy Heart adopts an authenticity that raises it above what could have been a generic tale of redemption.

Then there are the sensational songs, many of which are performed by Bridges and Farrell, written for the film by T Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton. The music performed in Crazy Heart actually becomes more engaging and sophisticated during the course of the film as the characters move from performing songs that are reliable old favourites to trying out more emotive and complex material. You don’t need to be a country music fan to enjoy Crazy Heart but there is a good chance you will become one afterwards thanks to this gracefully restrained and sweet drama.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio)

Martin Scorsese’s adaptation of the novel Shutter Island (by Mystic River and Gone, Baby, Gone author Dennis Lehane) is a film that operates on a heightened level that almost makes a traditional narrative analysis redundant. While the core story of two US Marshals in 1954 investigating the seemingly impossible disappearance of an escapee from an island based prison for the criminally insane is compelling, the film’s ultimate achievement is its manipulation of perception on a filmic level. Even elements that may trick the untrained eye and ear into thinking that they are experiencing a flawed film are deliberately calculated stylistic and narrative elements that only fully make sense after the final dénouement.

Scorsese has often displayed a subjective flair in his filmmaking particularly in early films such as Mean Streets, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull. In Shutter Island he pushes this one step further by representing Shutter Island’s Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane as an almost other worldly place designed to snare and foil US Marshal Teddy Daniels. Played by Leonardo DiCaprio in one of his strongest performances to-date, Daniels is a classic melancholic masculine Scorsese protagonist. Daniels is haunted by the death of his wife and his experiences as a soldier liberating the Dachau concentration camp. He is unpredictable, volatile and easily provoked. Yet he also possesses aspects of Twin Peaks’s memorable Special Agent Dale Cooper character in that he has a brilliant investigative mind, he is intuitive and he seems to receive information about the case from his dreams.

Dr Cawley (Ben Kingsley), Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo), Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio)

While there are elements of Shutter Island that would not feel out of place in a David Lynch film, Scorsese’s real point-of-reference must surely be Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. Scorsese may have even read Geoffrey Cocks’s book The Wolf at the Door where Cocks argues that the subtext of The Shining was the Holocaust. Not only does Scorsese use a lot of music by the Kubrick favoured composer György Ligeti but the use of sound, tracking shots and production design distinctively presents the Ashecliffe Hospital in a similar way to The Overlook Hotel in The Shining. Both are buildings filled with labyrinthine spaces that threaten to consume their occupants.

Shutter Island is the work of a true master who is completely accomplished in the art of filmmaking. It is apparent from almost the beginning of Shutter Island that there is something strange going on and the enjoyment is in the experience of watching it all unfold. Shutter Island is a film that leaves you feeling satisfied but during the end credits your brain will start to churn. As the film’s impact sinks deeper and deeper into your mind you will start to truly appreciate how ingenious it is on so many levels. An hour later you will be making plans to see it again.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke) and Lionel 'Elvis' Cormac (Willem Dafoe)

After the marvellous 2003 Australian zombie/science-fiction film Undead, the Queensland filmmaking brothers Michael and Peter Spierig have now written and directed the Australian/USA co-production Daybreakers. Set in 2019, Daybreakers presents a future where the vampires have won and now populate the Earth. As the blood supply begins to run dry, the human-friendly vampire researcher Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke), who is searching for a blood substitute, falls in with a gang of renegade humans.

The techno-gothic world of Daybreakers merges classic vampire mythology with advanced technology and corporate culture in a way not too dissimilar to the Blade films and the Angel television series. Daybreakers is nevertheless highly inventive, containing plenty of interesting and original ideas about vampire technology, vampire physiology and the sociological implications of a vampire world.

Unfortunately weak dialogue and plotting drag the film down and not even the strong cast, which includes Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill and Claudia Karvan, are able to compensate. Attempts at humour fall flat and the over-reliance on CGIs makes the futuristic city setting look artificial. For all its conceptual greatness Daybreakers is ultimately a B-grade film that never quite lives up to its potential.

Originally appeared in The Big Issue, No. 347, 2010

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim)

Malik El Djebena is a 19-year-old repeat offender who is thrown into a French prison to do six years for assaulting a policeman. Malik is part Arab, part Corsican and not wanted by either group who both have a strong presence in the prison, locked in a long running power struggle. Malik is illiterate, young, fragile and covered with bruises and scars from previous altercations. A Prophet’s shadowed and noisy opening thrusts Malik out of the darkness and into the harsh light of the prison in a way that suggests he is ‘born’ into the prison like a vulnerable child. Despite his chances of survival looking grim Malik soon takes his first steps in his transformation as a master criminal when the dominant Corsican prison gang force him to kill for them.

Directed and co-written by Jacques Audiard (The Beat That My Heart Skipped) A Prophet is essentially a gangster film with a number of distinguishing differences. For a start, Malik’s criminal ascent occurs while he is in prison but thanks to the corrupt networks within the prison, which also allow him the occasional day pass, he is able to operate successful activities in the outside world. Also, apart from his initial act of forced violence, Malik’s success is predominantly due to his studious self-education and cunning rather than displays of power and might.

Malik and Corsican prison gang leader César Luciani (Niels Arestrup)

A Prophet’s social realism style separates it from the more traditionally glamorous or sensationalist gangster films so that its portrayal of somebody marginalised by French society becoming indoctrinated into criminality functions as a genuine social critique of both the prison system and prejudices within France. However, A Prophet also contains several effective non-realistic touches that border on surrealism, which clearly identifies it as a work of fiction as opposed to the cold reality of organised crime that is represented in the equally excellent Italian film Gomorrah.

A Prophet is an extremely gripping and exciting film. The scenes leading up to moments of violence are incredibly tense and even through we know what is about to happen, the violence in this film is genuinely shocking. The almost-unknown actor Tahar Rahim portrays Malik as a likeable yet unsettling anti-hero and his transformation from a virtual child to a gangster is convincing and frightening.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Lawrence Talbot (Benicio del Toro)

Abandoned by its original director and with its release date pushed back several times before finally being unleashed on audiences, The Wolfman arrives with very low expectations that it meets with gusto. A loose remake of the 1941 Universal monster film The Wolf Man, this new incarnation of the classic werewolf story initially looks like an enticing blend of the original film, Hammer Horror films and Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow. However, it very quickly becomes apparent that the The Wolfman fails to capture any of the magic or thrills that this would suggest.

Set in 1891 Lawrence Talbot, played by Benicio del Toro, returns home to Blackmoor in England after the death of his brother. The audience knows a werewolf got his brother, many of the film’s characters know that a werewolf got him and yet the film takes a painfully long time to arrive at the point where it is ‘revealed’ that a werewolf is to blame. By that point Talbot has been bitten and is starting to notice that his body is changing.

The Wolfman demonstrates what truly bad writing really is. Del Toro’s uncharacteristically soap-opera acting style doesn’t help the horribly trite dialogue and Anthony Hopkins, as Talbot’s father, certainly doesn’t help either by sounding bored beyond comprehension throughout the entire film. Emily Blunt as Talbot’s brother’s fiancé and Hugo Weaving as a Scotland Yard policeman do a little better but only just.

The poor pacing, blatantly obvious narrative signposting and over-reliance on false scares generated by sudden sounds and movements, removes any chance of The Wolfman actually being frightening. The gore is not gruesome enough to be shocking and not over-the-top enough to be fun schlock. It’s a terribly serious film and as a result very dull. One minor point of interest is the representation of a psychiatrist as a mad scientist character since it would be interesting to find out if the filmmakers actually intended on depicting the hysterical religious fanatic characters as being right all along while the scientific community appear as villainous fools.

The Wolfman contains elements that evoke The Crow (long roof top chase), the various King Kong films (creature is brought to a populated city where it goes wild) and Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 version of Dracula (romance doomed by one of them being a murderous monster). It is a damning comparison in every case and even the supposedly state-of-the-art transformation sequences fall seriously short of the effects used in John Landis’s 1981 film An American Werewolf in London. On the plus side there are a few unintentional giggles to be had over the fact that once transformed into the werewolf, Talbot looks and sounds a lot like Chewbacca.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Claireece "Precious" Jones (Gabourey Sidibe)

Claireece “Precious” Jones is a 16-year-old African American girl living in Harlem in 1987 although ‘barely surviving’ seems to be a better way of describing her situation rather than ‘living’. Precious is obese, illiterate and pregnant with her second child as a result of being raped by her father. Living with her physically, psychologically and sexually abusive mother, Precious desperately needs some way of escaping from her world. That opportunity comes in the form of an alternative school and although the full extent of Precious’s woes are yet to come, the supportive classmates and inspirational teacher Precious meets gives her the chance she needs to break free.

Adapted from the 1996 novel Push by African American author and performance poet Sapphire, Precious is the second film directed by Lee Daniels who had previously produced The Woodsman and Monster’s Ball. The basic narrative of Precious is very simple but its strengths are in its powerful dialogue and the incredibly strong performances from its nearly all female cast. Newcomer Gabourey Sidibe is a revelation as Precious giving the character a sullen and defensive exterior that when broken down is absolutely heartbreaking. As Mary Lee Johnston, Precious’s abusive mother, comedian and comic actor Mo’Nique is completely terrifying and contemptible.  Mary’s astonishing ignorance and stupidity may have given her a degree of sympathy if she wasn’t so viciously selfish and defiantly proud of her lack of education.

Mary Lee Johnston (Mo'Nique)

What makes Precious bearable are the moments of warmth, hope and humour that are delivered mainly during the scenes with Precious’s teacher and classmates. Unfortunately Daniels doesn’t seem to be confident enough in the material to allow such scenes to speak for themselves so he has littered Precious with small Magic Realist touches and fantasy sequences where Precious imagines herself in various glamorous situations. Victims of repeated sexual abuse and violence in the home reportedly often disassociate themselves from both their own bodies and surroundings as a physiological coping mechanism but Daniels handles the depiction of this in a clumsy and repetitive way.  Nevertheless there is no denying the incredible power of Precious and while it doesn’t reach the same heights of landmark films such as Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing or John Singleton’s Boyz n the Hood, it deserves a place in the canon of bold, confronting and relevant African American filmmaking.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Thomas Craven (Mel Gibson)

Edge of Darkness is a heavily Americanised remake of an acclaimed 1985 BBC television miniseries, with one of the film’s producers (Michael Wearing) and its director (Martin Campbell) respectively being the producer and director of the original series. The basic premise has remained: a young woman is brutally gunned down in what appears to have been a revenge kill that was meant for her policeman father. The policeman (Thomas Craven in the film and played by Mel Gibson) is not convinced he was the target and upon investigation discovers his daughter’s involvement in an anti-nuclear organisation accused of terrorism. The dense, murky and frankly bleak six-part English political thriller has been condensed and simplified for this film version but with Casino Royale’s director Campbell at the helm the film starts off as a largely decent adaptation for the big screen. Campbell often shoots scenes from unusual locations to suggest concealment and therefore increase the film’s paranoia plus the extra dollops of action and violence do help to move the story along at a brisk pace.

For the most part Mel Gibson does a terrific job at portraying Craven. He methodically goes about his investigation with the cold detachment of man who is bottling in his emotions and still partially in a state of shock. After directing such hysterical portrayals of martyrdom in films such as Braveheart and The Passion of the Christ, Gibson is clearly suited to playing a character like Craven whose desire for justice and revenge stops him from caring about the variety of ways he puts his life at risk. We don’t really need him to tell us that he is “a guy with nothing to lose who doesn’t give a shit” but his cold and ruthless delivery of the line is still effectively chilling. It is only later in the film that Gibson starts to go over the top, relying a bit too heavily on his trademark crazy-darting-wide-eyed expression (think Franco Zeffirelli’s Hamlet and The Lethal Weapon films) to indicate that he is becoming unhinged.

Darius Jedburgh (Ray Winstone) and Craven

Unfortunately something goes horribly wrong towards the end of Edge of Darkness. The film never reached the same dramatic heights as the original television series but for its first two acts it functions well as a taut and engaging action/thriller. However, for the third act it loses all credibility and suspense by derailing into a messy and pulpy mash-up of Dr. No and Death Wish. If you’ve ever seen Orson Welles’s The Magnificent Ambersons you will understand the incredible disappointment and frustration at how the closing scenes (shot by another director and spliced in against the wishes of Welles) undermine the rest of the film. However, in the case of The Magnificent Ambersons such an ending reduced a film that could have been a masterpiece to a film that just falls short of being a masterpiece. In the case of the 2010 film version Edge of Darkness, its misguided third act is enough to reduce it from a film worth seeing to a film worth avoiding.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Malcolm Tucker (Peter Capaldi) and Lt. Gen. George Miller (James Gandolfini)

Barely disguising its intentions to ridicule the circumstances that lead to the 2002 Iraq Invasion, In the Loop examines the fictitious machinations of UK and USA spin-doctors, career politicians and advisors who get caught up in a debate about whether or not to declare war in the Middle East. As everybody plays off each other for political gain it soon becomes apparent than in modern politics you must either compromise your morals or be destroyed.

Made by the UK comedic writer/director Armando Iannucci as a stand-alone spin-off from his TV series The Thick of It (think The Office meets Yes Minister), In the Loop is both ruthlessly cynical and extremely funny. While the consistently strong cast includes recognisable names such as Steve Coogan and James Gandolfini, it is Scottish actor Peter Capaldi as the unstoppable spin-doctor Malcolm Tucker who truly stars. Tucker’s profanity-filled tirades of abuse would intimidate the entire cast of Glengarry Glen Ross, making him one of the most delightfully repugnant characters to grace the screen.

In the Loop is political satire at its best, leaving you giggling at the one-liners yet feeling complete despair about the political process.

Originally appeared in The Big Issue, No. 346, 2010

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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The Man (Viggo Mortensen) and The Boy (Kodi Smit-McPhee)

After the success of Joel and Ethan Coen’s adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s No Country For Old Men, the next novel by McCarthy that was the obvious one to adapt for the screen was his Pulitzer Price-winning novel The Road. When it was announced that Australian director John Hillcoat was going to direct there was a sense of relief. Hillcoat’s previous film, his 2005 Australian Western masterpiece The Proposition, articulated the sort of violent existentialism and bleak landscapes that are to be found in McCarthy’s story about an unnamed man and his son trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. Also, Hillcoat’s début feature film, the 1988 futuristic prison drama Ghosts… of the Civil Dead, contains a similar fragmented narrative to The Road where a sense of relentless monotony is punctuated with extreme, but fleeting, incidents.

The trust placed in Hillcoat to adapt The Road has paid off and the result is one of cinema’s most faithful adaptations. Hillcoat has embellished some aspects of the novel and condensed others for the purpose of making the text more cinematic but it would be very difficult to question any of his decisions as by doing so he has successfully ensured that The Road functions as a film in its own right.

As the unnamed father in the film, Viggo Mortensen delivers an astonishing performance as a man who is essentially trying to survive while still doing the right thing. The parental bond that Mortensen establishes on screen with the 13-year-old actor Kodi Smit-McPhee playing his son is extremely powerful and this bond gives the film the small bursts of humanity that radiate out through the bleakness. Smit-McPhee is astonishing and demonstrates a disciplined approach to portraying complex emotions on-screen that is far beyond his years. Together the pair ‘carry the fire’ through a wilderness populated by murderers, rapists and cannibals.

Visually The Road is a relentless palate of greys and browns making the eye initially struggle to adjust to its lack of colour and light. This of course is part of what makes the film such a beautiful expression of McCarthy’s prose and Hillcoat wisely uses a low-key combination of location footage and CGIs to create a sad industrial wasteland that is more reminiscent of Tarkovsky’s Stalker than Mad Max.

The one main sticking point many may have with Hillcoat’s The Road is the ending, which, although it stays faithful to the novel, on the surface may appear compromised. It is nevertheless a fitting conclusion that actually remains completely true to the core ideas expressed throughout the rest of the film and upon extended reflection it becomes clear that it is the only ending that is possible. Anything else would have upset the delicate balance of ideas and meaning that make The Road resonate so profoundly.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman)

William Ernest Henley’s poem “Invictus”, written in 1875, is said to have been a powerful source of inspiration for Nelson Mandela during the 27 years he was kept a prisoner in Apartheid South Africa. Mandela was released from prison in 1990 and four years later became South Africa’s president after helping to end Apartheid and introduce democratic elections. Director Clint Eastwood’s film Invictus portrays Mandela as a man of great intelligence, compassion and fairness. Mandela was all too aware that great tensions still existed in South Africa and that the only way for his nation to heal was through forgiveness but also for the people to develop a sense of unity. Mandela seized upon the opportunity provided by South Africa hosting the 1995 Rugby World Cup to make the national South African rugby team, the Springboks, a source of inspiration for all South Africans, black and white. Invictus portrays the PR campaign and series of rugby matches that resulted.

Adapted from the book Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game that Made a Nation, by journalist John Carlin, Invictus is an examination of the relationship between sport and politics. Invictus never gets too much deeper than establishing this connection in its precise historical context but it does convincingly demonstrate the incredible importance and significance a sports game can have to a nation. During the scenes depicting the cup you very quickly find yourself cheering on the Springbok’s knowing how profound the outcome of the matches will be.

François Pienaar (Matt Damon)

Working with Eastwood for the third time after Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby, Morgan Freeman gives one of his best performances to date as Nelson Mandela. Freeman beautifully captures Mandela’s charisma, confidence and genuine enthusiasm for both rugby and reconciliation. Matt Damon is also convincing as the South African sporting hero François Pienaar the Springbok team captain. However, many of the best moments in Invictus occur during the scenes depicting Mandela’s security team who are a combination of Mandela’s personal guards and ex-Apartheid Special Branch men. The initially tense dynamic between the security men functions as a microcosm for black and white relations within South Africa, creating an enjoyable subplot throughout the film.

Invictus begins as a political biopic, ends as a sports film and is entertaining throughout.  Eastwood is one of the most reliable and assured directors working today and like most of his films Invictus combines his disciplined approach to filmmaking with his calm desire to not rush proceedings in order to allow the story to leisurely unfold. There is nothing particularly remarkable about Invictus but it suitably delivers plenty of emotive moments that are hard to not be swept away by and the final rugby game is suitably exhilarating.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Guido Contini (Daniel Day-Lewis) and Luisa Contini (Marion Cotillard)

The 1960s Italian filmmaker Guido Contini (Daniel Day-Lewis) is in a creative slump and hasn’t written a word of the script for his new film. To placate the media, the film’s producer ostentatiously announces that Guido’s film will be about Italy “as a myth, as a woman, as a dream.”  This description encapsulates Nine, a musical dripping in Italian chic, which borders on the fetishistic, about the mythology surrounding a great filmmaker, the women in his life and the dreams he slips into to make sense of it all. Nine is a cinematic adaptation of a 1982 Broadway musical, which was itself an adaptation of Federico Fellini’s playful, self-reflexive and semi-autobiographical 1963 film 8½. Nine was an excellent opportunity to make a cinematic spectacular but unfortunately director Rob Marshall has instead churned out a largely by-the-numbers musical.

Marshall’s biggest mistake is his very conservative approach towards the fantasy sequences. While Fellini intertwined the subjective and objective moments of 8½, blurring the boundary between reality and fantasy, Marshall frames all the musical numbers as fantasy scenes that are detached from the real world. It’s a stodgy and boring approach made worse by the fact that all the songs take place in a clearly delineated ‘dream-space’ that is an empty theatre stage with bits of half built scaffolding. Instead of breaking free of the restraints of Nines’s theatrical origins, Marshall has embraced them and the musical numbers suffer as a result. Marshall had a similar approach to the songs in his excellent 2002 film adaptation of Chicago but it suited the format of that show while it does not in the case of Nine.

Marshall’s unambitious approach means that despite the bevy of sultry backup dancers in corsets, fishnets and suspenders (aren’t we over this look in ‘sassy’ musicals yet?) the music numbers mostly lack excitement. This is a shame because the mainly all female cast do an excellent job. Day-Lewis is as reliably immersed in the part of Guido as always, but Nine belongs to Marion Cotillard, Penélope Cruz, Nicole Kidman, Judi Dench, Kate Hudson, Sophia Loren and Stacy Ferguson (Fergie) who are all in top form playing the women in Guido’s life. Cotillard (Public Enemies, La Vie en Rose) as his long suffering wife is perhaps the one who shines the most. She gets the best numbers, she is the best written character (the rest of the women are maternal figures or objects of desire) and the camera adores her.

There are moments in Nine where the combination of music, spectacle and subjective filmmaking is just right and the final sequence in particular hints at how great the rest of the film may have been. Otherwise Nine is a disappointment and it really needed a more inventive and unrestrained director, such as Alan Parker, Tim Burton or even Baz Luhrmann, to do it justice. While Fellini’s 8½ was a glorious melange of myths, women and dreams, Marshall’s Nine is the product of a neat freak whose determination to tidy everything up ruins all the fun.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Derek Thompson (Dwayne Johnson)

Derek Thompson (Dwayne Johnson) is a close to washed-up ice hockey player who is affectionately known as “The Tooth Fairy” due to his ability to wipe out opposing players on the rink, an action that usually results in their loss of teeth. Having long ago given up the dream of ever scoring during a game, Derek is happy to lap up the adulation he receives from the crowds for causing such carnage. However, when Derek’s overly pragmatic approach to coping with life by having low expectations results in him telling a young boy to also abandon his dreams, Derek is magically taken to Fairyland where he learns that he must atone for his dream-killing sins by doing time as a tooth fairy.

The tough guy having to deal with the world of children comedic scenario has been popular since Arnold Schwarzenegger’s stint in Kindergarden Cop in 1990. Just the contrast between the tiny physiques of children to the muscular and hyper masculine body of action stars, like former professional wrestler Dwayne Johnson, provides a basic degree of amusement. Throughout Tooth Fairy Derek has to somehow reconcile the delicate world of fairy magic with his bulky and destructive presence and most of the gags in the film are bull-in-a-China-shop type situations as he screws up various attempts at retrieving teeth from under the pillows of sleeping children.

Johnson has in the past proven to be a very charismatic performer who is excellent in supporting roles as a character actor. Unfortunately, he just doesn’t have to talent to sustain a lead role, especially a comedic lead role. It is impossible to dislike the guy but his constant mugging for the camera does wear thin and very few laughs ensue. However, he still comes out a lot better than Ashley Judd, as Thompson’s girlfriend Carly, who is absolutely woeful.

Derek Thompson (Dwayne Johnson) and Tracy (Stephen Merchant)

What makes Tooth Fairy far from being a total loss is the inclusion of a very strong supporting cast. Billy Crystal has a marvellously funny cameo as a sort of Fairy Q character, who is in charge of dispensing the magical items used for teeth collection, and Julie Andrews as the stern but fair matriarch of Fairyland is a delight. However, the most significant aspect of Tooth Fairy is that for the first time English comedy writer, actor and performer Stephen Merchant finally gets a significant role. As the co-creator of the television series The Office and Extras, Merchant has been somewhat left in the shadow of co-creator Ricky Gervais’s meteoric rise to fame.  Merchant has had cameos in various films, plus he played the incompetent agent in Extras, but as Tracy, Thompson’s reluctant caseworker, Merchant really gets to shine. Merchant is so effortlessly funny that when he’s not on screen you are impatiently waiting for him to appear again. Once he is there you forget about the fact that for the most part Tooth Fairy is fairly mediocre entertainment.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Willie (Rocky McKenzie)

The latest film by Indigenous Australian filmmaker Rachel Perkins (Radiance, One Night the Moon) is a road trip musical set in 1969. Indigenous teenager Willie (newcomer Rocky McKenzie) dutifully heads off to a boarding school in Perth only to then run away in order to get back to his home in Broome so he can declare his love for local singer Rosie (2006 Australian Idol runner-up Jessica Mauboy). Along the way Willie teams up with a homeless Indigenous elder named Uncle Tadpole (Ernie Dingo) and a couple of hippy backpackers (one of whom is played by Australian singer-songwriter Missy Higgins). With Father Benedictus (Geoffrey Rush) from Willie’s boarding school in hot pursuit, the journey home involves much singing, a bit of dancing and a few wacky hi-jinks.

Bran Nue Dae began as a collection of songs written in the early 1980s by composer, musician and playwright Jimmy Chi and his band Knuckles. Chi later used these songs to create the original stage musical Bran Nue Dae, which successfully debuted at the 1990 Perth Festival. Twenty years later this new film adaptation feels exactly like a twenty year old show that may have worked wonderfully as a piece of community theatre but not so on the big screen. The film is so incredibly well–intentioned and full of energy that you almost hate yourself for finding it so twee but overall the prevailing pantomime aesthetic of Bran Nue Dae is just too strong. The over-the-top performances would usually be suitable for this style of musical romp but the story, songs and dance numbers are not strong enough to sustain such hammy performances.

Uncle Tadpole (Ernie Dingo) and Annie ('Missy' Higgins)

Many of the song lyrics are actually very poignant and wickedly ironic but any sense of their sly and cheeky political commentary is lost in the film’s very trite approach. The presence of Bran Nue Dae’s charms are detectable but they are overshadowed by sight gags such as Father Benedictus taking a dump by the side of the road and jokes involving Magda Szubanski, as a character named Roadhouse Betty, throwing herself at every man she meets (it’s funny because she is a large woman being sexually aggressive).

Bran Nue Dae is not completely without merit and Ernie Dingo is especially a joy to watch as Uncle Tadpole. Unlike most of the rest of the cast, Dingo knows how to have fun with a character without completely overacting. Tom Budge (Ten Empty) also gives a very funny performance as a German hippy and manages to bring a bit of an extra dimension to an otherwise very stereotypical character. Otherwise there is little that appeals about Bran Nue Dae. It is the type of film that you could enjoy if you could just let go and surrender yourself to it but far too many cringe worthy moments constantly prevent you from being able to do so.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick) and Ryan Bingham (George Clooney)

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) adores the world of airports, chain hotels and loyalty cards. His life as a motivational speaker and downsizing man-for-hire keeps him travelling around America enjoying his status as a privileged business flier. Charming, slick and truly happy with his unencumbered lifestyle, which is free of physical and emotional baggage, Bingham revels in his life “on the road”. Preferring to work on his frequent flier miles collection rather than engaging with people Bingham is less than impressed when his boss Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman) lumps him with young up-and-comer efficiency expert Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick from the Twilight films). If Tyler Durden in Fight Club represented a primal force that at the end of the 1990s wanted to break free of the commodity culture, Bingham represents the tamed desire, which ten years later, wants to embrace the superficial security and comforts of that culture.

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) and Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga)

Up in the Air is the third feature by writer/director Jason Reitman and it has a lot more in common with his 2005 corporate comedy Thank You for Smoking, which Reitman also wrote, than it does with his 2007 teen pregnancy comedy Juno. As with Thank You for Smoking, Up in the Air features a charismatic anti-hero lead character who in any other film would be the bad guy. Reitman and Clooney do an extremely good job at endearing Bingham to the audience and making us understand why he loves his life so much. We should feel either pity or contempt at his shallow existence but in fact we instead start to become seduced by it especially when he hooks up with Alex Goran (played marvellously by Vera Farmiga from Orphan and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas) who is his female counterpart. For the most part Up in the Air is a breezy comedy that will appeal to anybody who has ever had to do extensive travel for work or attend corporate conferences.

Unfortunately Up in the Air does lose its bite in the third act and ends up lacking the wicked edge of Thank You for Smoking. Reitman drives the film towards a disappointingly conventional epiphany and then comeuppance sequence of events that detracts from the film as a whole. Up in the Air still resolves smartly and genuinely with a satisfyingly bittersweet conclusion but goes for a safe middle ground. Reitman’s film is far from being a masterpiece but he has succeeded in making Up in the Air very much a film of its time.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Facebook and Twitter
I do see more films than I write full reviews about so I often post micro reviews and updates on both Cinema Autopsy’s Facebook page and Twitter account. Both Facebook and Twitter are also great ways to get in touch with me.

On air
I’ll be back on Triple R (3RRR 102.7) next Wednesday 13 January 2010 at 8:15am to chat to the Summer Breakfasters about It’s Complicated. I’m also hoping to get some more Graveyard Shifts on Triple R this year to play my collection of film music throughout the dead of the night!

I resume co-hosting The Casting Couch on JOY 94.9 next Saturday 16 January 2010 at 5:00pm for a new season of weekly film reviews, interviews and conversation. The Casting Couch also has its own Facebook page.

The On Air page is regularly updated with details about what is coming up on The Casting Couch plus you can find links to the playlists from when I’ve selected the music and our podcasts.

Both Triple R and JOY can be streamed live via their respective websites but please note that all times are Melbourne, Australia daylight savings time (UTC/GMT +11).

Page to Picture: The Road
On Tuesday January 26 2010 at 3.30pm (public holiday) I will be moderating a panel discussion about John Hillcoat’s film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. A pre-release screening of The Road will precede the discussion. The panel are a diverse and impressive bunch (see the Cinema Nova website for more details) so hopefully I’ll be able to hold my own!

Top Films of the 2000s
I am planning to do a list of my favourite films of the decade that has just passed but am holding off until I see a few specific 2009 films that are yet to be released in Australia. Hopefully that list will be posted by late February but in the meantime have a look at my Top Ten films from 2009 (released in Melbourne, Australia) if you haven’t done so already.

Here’s to 2010 being a great year in the cinema!
Thomas

Balibo

Instead of writing the usual apology or disclaimer for creating a Best Of list, I’m just going to confess that I love creating these lists as they provide a snapshot of what films I was most immediately impressed by from the year that has just finished. As time passes many of these films will fade from memory while some continue to resonate and establish themselves in film history so it will be nice to be able to refer back to such a list and remind myself of films that may be forgotten.

Top Ten films with a theatrical release in Melbourne, Australian in 2009

1. Balibo (Robert Connolly, 2009)
2. Rachel Getting Married (Jonathan Demme, 2008)
3. Avatar (James Cameron, 2009)
4. Genova (Michael Winterbottom, 2008)
5. Antichrist (Lars von Trier, 2009)
6. Samson and Delilah (Warwick Thornton, 2009)
7. Up (Pete Docter, 2009)
8. Two Lovers (James Gray, 2008)
9. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Terry Gilliam, 2009)
10. Every Little Step (Adam Del Deo and James D. Stern, 2008)

Rachel Getting Married

The film that left the biggest impression on me in 2009 was Balibo, which left me initially feeling completely shattered and later left me in awe of how skilfully crafted it is with its combination of human drama, international politics and historical detail. The only two films I saw twice in the cinema in 2009 were Rachel Getting Married and Avatar; films at almost the opposite end of the spectrum to one another in representing what cinema can achieve. The ultra small scale Rachel Getting Married provided a deeply emotional examination of family dynamics and my love of cinema that captures a sense of place and something deeply human is further reflected by my inclusion of Genova, Samson and Delilah, Two Lovers and Every Little Step. The extravagant spectacle Avatar created one of the most immersive cinema experiences to date and my love of cinema as a visual art form is further reflected by my inclusion of Antichrist, Up and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.

Honourable mentions

Milk (Gus Van Sant, 2008)
The Wrestler (Darren Aronofsky, 2008)
Let the Right One In (Låt den rätte komma in, Tomas Alfredson, 2008)
District 9 (Neill Blomkamp, 2009)
Moon (Duncan Jones, 2009)
Bright Star (Jane Campion, 2009)
Gomorrah (Gomorra, Matteo Garrone, 2008)
Summer Hours (L’Heure d’été, Olivier Assayas, 2008)
Mary and Max (Adam Elliot, 2009)
The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch, 2009)

Top Ten unreleased films (in Melbourne)

Love Exposure

While Melbourne is a tremendous city for film, especially with cinemas such as Cinema Nova that are very much committed to independent releases, a number of exceptional films still miss out on getting general theatrical releases. Fortunately for the Melbourne based film lover there is the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) and what seems like an endless stream of film festivals picking up the slack. For this reason I’ve separately listed films screened in Melbourne in 2009 but not given a general theatrical release (and to date not scheduled for a 2010 release).

1. Love Exposure (Ai no mukidashi, Sion Sono, 2008)
2. 35 Shots of Rum (35 rhums, Claire Denis, 2008)

3. Paper Soldiers (Bumazhnyy soldat, Aleksei German MI., 2008)
4. Thirst (Bakjwi, Park Chan-wook, 2009)
5. The Good, the Bad, the Weird (Joheunnom nabbeunnom isanghannom, Kim Ji-woon, 2008)
6. Public Enemy Number One (Part 1) (L’instinct de mort, Jean-François Richet, 2008)
7. Mother (Madeo, Bong Joon-ho, 2009)
8. Bronson (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2009)
9. JCVD (Mabrouk El Mechri, 2008)
10. T Is for Teacher (Rohan Spong, 2009)

Dogs in Space

Melbourne also benefits from a wide range of retrospective screenings and in a year that was already spectacular for Australian cinema it was an added bonus to have screenings and then long overdue DVD releases of Richard Lowenstein’s 1986 masterpiece Dogs in Space and Ted Kotcheff’s ‘lost’ 1971 classic Wake in Fright. Watching a newly restored print of Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West (C’era una volta il West, 1968) at The Astor Theatre was another highlight on the cinematic year as was visiting ACMI’s Dennis Hopper and the New Hollywood exhibition. The Melbourne Cinémathèque once again provided a terrific program in 2009 and it was great to finally catch-up on some previously unseen films by Ingmar Bergman and Samuel Fuller as well as discovering for the first time the under-appreciated cinema of Frank Borzage.

Also appears here on Senses of Cinema, Issue No. 53, 2010.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010