Forsaken.

When you have an actor of Brian Cox standing introducing the UK Premiere of a Canadian western at the 2016 Edinburgh International Film Festival you know your in for a treat and this genre classic was certainly that. All right I admit I am a lover of westerns and Forsaken (2015) is certainly a good old-fashioned tale of good verses bad. Directed by Jon Cassar, who will be best known for his work on the first seven seasons of the TV drama 24, it tells the story of a reformed gunslinger who attempts to resist violence to appease his preacher father.

 

Will John Henry use his guns again?

John Henry Clayton returns home after ten years away following the end of the civil war in 1865. He has become a man that never hesitates to kill another in a gunfight. The problem with John Henry's return is that since his departure his hometown is now jointly controlled by a vicious gang boss and corporate businessman James McCurdy (a very evil Mr Cox) who are terrifying the local farmers into selling their land. If they refuse extreme violence occurs normally ending in a funeral. Gang boss Frank Tillman (Aaron Poole) seems to relish the violence he is employed to carry out. Also employed by McCurdy is a famous gunslinger known as Gentleman Dave Turner (the wonderful Michael Wincott who played Philo Grant in one of my all time favourite movies 1995's Strange Days). McCurdy knows that if John Henry decides to take the side of the farmers and pick up his guns again then the eloquent Gentleman Dave is the only man capable of facing him in a gunfight. Now married with a young son Mary Alice Watson (Demi Moore) is another temptation for the troubled preachers son as she was the woman he left behind. Will or won't he pick up his guns to help the brutalised farmers, what would entice him back to kill men again after the promises to his father? I think we could all guess the answer to that and by the end of the film you will be gagging for that good fashioned gun battle.

 

Will he have to face Gentleman Dave Turner in a fight to the death?

The film's real strength is in the partnering of father and son Kiefer and Donald Sutherland who play father and son in the movie. Brian Cox gave us some background to their relationship informing us that the turbulent association they had on screen was very much like the relationship they had off screen, both men had not got on very well and this film was a chance to put that right. Tears were shed, voices were raised but all was well in the end. Interestingly the two actors have only previously appeared in two films together, but never in the same scene.

 

Will John henry live long enough to rekindle his affair with Mary Alice Watson?

Shot in the province of Alberta in Canada it had its World Premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2015 but has not had a general release in the UK but can be found on DVD and believe me its very good example of the western genre and is well worth sourcing.

October Gale.

The difference between slow and plodding can be the difference between a slow but interesting story that gradually reaches a well-appreciated climax that rewards viewer’s for their patience. Where as plodding is something quite different. I would describe it as a narrative where nothing really happens and leads to ending that's neither exciting nor rewarding. I would deem October Gale (2015) written and directed by Ruba Nadda, as plodding. Breaching the trades description act by calling it self a thriller is does boast a couple of well known actors including one of my favourite actresses Patricia Clarkson, British actor Tim Roth and London born Scott Speedman who I'm not quite so familiar with.

Clarkson plays Helen Matthews whose husband died in a tragic boating accident one weekend while the pair was staying at their island holiday cottage. It's now been 12 months since her husband's death and Helen decides to return. Virtually cut of after her boat brakes down she spends her time clearing out ‘stuff’ that's not needed. During a night storm she hears noises and discovers a boat attached to her jetty, inside the craft are traces of blood. Returning to what she thinks is the safety of the cottage she finds a man (Speedman) laid out on the floor with a nasty bullet hole in his shoulder.

Even Ms Clarkson can't save this tedious movie. 

We get flashbacks of her time at the retreat with her husband and also some idea of why her visitor ended up bleeding all over her carpet – yawn yawn! Even a belated appearance by Tim Roth, who can't save the tedium of the movies lame build up and its disappointing ending, who was much better in Michael Haneke’s US version of Funny Games (2007) which I think the director is trying to emulate - but without much success.

Maps to the Stars.

“Hollywood is a world that is seductive and repellent at the same time, and it is the combination of the two that makes it so potent.”[1] David Cronenburg latest cinematic outing is a comment on human nature, part satirical sendup of Hollywood, part dysfunctional family drama and part decent into madness. It was Ben Wagner’s screenplay that persuaded the Canadian director to make a film about Los Angeles located amongst Hollywood personalities.  Maps to the Stars (2014) is Cronenburg’s first film shot in the USA although many have been set there.

The jaded movie star.

The pyromaniac. 

Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore) was a famous actress who is now aging and quickly fading, a women haunted by memories of her mother a famous movie star who abused her as a child to such an extent that she is still having therapy years after her mother died in a fire.  But this does not stop her wanting to play her mater in a remake of one of her most famous movies. The other main characters belong to the family Weiss. Father Sanford (John Cusack) is a celebrity TV psychologist, a man who see’s himself as a healer and who, incidentally, is in control of Havana’s therapy. Sanford and his wife Christina (Olivia Williams) are sister and brother; they were separated at birth and discovered their true relationship after meeting in college and becoming a couple. Christina also act’s as the manager of her precocious 13 year old son Benjie (Evan Bird), who after a stint at rehab when he was nine years old is attempting to put his movie career back on track while at the same time battling his demons. In to this potent mix we add Benjie’s sister Agatha (Mia Wasikowska) who has recently been released from a sanatorium where she was treated for criminal pyromania. Turning up in LA unannounced, still carrying the visible scars of her crime, she gets a job as the personnel assistant of Havana and attempts to re-engage with her family.

The healer who married his sister.

The manager who married her brother.

One very precocious brat. 

The strength of the film is in Wagner’s characters, the pull that LA has on them and finally how the narrative gradually reveals there complicated lives, secrets and fears. As well as a comedic tone there is a darkness that runs right throughout the movie with its unsettling observation of celebrity culture. This entertaining cross between Sunset Boulevard (1950) and 1999’s Magnolia won Julianne Moore yet another best actress award this time at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival.

---

[1] David Cronenberg.

Mommy.

The latest work from Xavier Dolan was shown at the 2015 Glasgow Film Festival and confirmed why I now consider the Canadian born actor, writer and director one of the best young modern filmmakers and has certainly become a favourite of Movie Ramble. Shot on 35mm film stock and presented in the narrow 1:1 aspect for most of the film, Mommy (2014) returns to the mother and son relationship first tackled in his debut film I Killed My Mother (2009) in which he manages to present us with a semi biographical drama about the complications of such a relationship. It again stars the absolutely brilliant French-Canadian actress Anne Dorval in the lead role of Diane Despres.

 

Anna Dorval as Mommy of the title.

Mental illness and domestic distress are the foundations for this exceptional study of a three way human relationship. Diane is a widow whose hyperactive son Steve (Antoine-Oliver Pilon) is expelled from the institution he has been kept in since the death of his father when he became uncontrollable. When he returns home mother is overwhelmed by the task of looking after her wayward son, having enough problems looking after herself, the relationship proves to be emotionally stormy. But fortunately Diane befriends their new tongue-tied neighbour Kyla (Suzanne Clement) who turns out to be just what the relationship required. 

 

I challenge you not to have an empathy with the three main characters.

The film, which won the Jury Prize at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, focuses on character, allowing its audience to empathies with all three of the main protagonists and never forcing you to judge them. A piece of cinematic work that has true emotional depth and like the rest of the directors oeuvre it’s has cleverly written dialog and a great sense of humour. Dolan also provides us with an accomplished soundtrack that includes the likes of Counting Crows, Oasis and Beck. All three main leads give top class performances but Anne Dorval deserves an Oscar nomination for Best Actress for her astonishing performance. A tender humorous movie that deserves to be widely seen but only has a selected release in UK cinemas: why?   

Laurence Anyways.

Transsexualism is a feeling of identification with a gender inconsistent or not culturally associated with their assigned sex. For example where a persons assigned sex at birth conflicts with their psychological gender. Which is much different from what is referred to as transvestic fetishism a name given to those who are thought to have an excessive sexual or erotic interest in cross-dressing. Xavier Dolan’s third feature film after I Killed My Mother (2009) and Heartbeats (2010) is about the former. Laurence Anyways (2012) deals with a couple who are very much in love but are going through a enormous change, the male has disclosed that he has always felt more like a female than a man.

Laurence Ali is a 34-year-old teacher, an intelligent gentle man who is very much in love with Frederique Belair and has no desire that their loving relationship should end. But he always felt that his gender was an accident of birth and see’s himself as a man aging in the skin of a woman. Something that has been driving Laurence Ali insane since he was eight years old when he first started to dress as a young girl, something that has carried forward into his adult life. It has come to a point where he wants to go through the transformation, and 'come out' as a female, with the help of hormones his body can slowly change shape and in due course he can have a sexual reversal operation.

From this rather revolution disclosure Dolan's camera follow’s the couple and we discover how they manage to deal with such a traumatic experience. What affects will Laurence’s decision have on them and will being in love be enough to save their relationship or will it  

turn both their lives upside down. Do they both have transsexual traits; will the relationship work if they both exchange genders? A great touch was giving the leading lady a male name! It’s obvious that Fred is happy to live on the edge of 'normal' society and that the change will give Laurence a sense of relief but Fred feels she is loosing her identity, a sense of delayed shock perhaps or maybe she does not realise how much it's affecting her. 

 

The wonderfully talented Suzanna Clement plays Fred. 

Xavier Dolan always intended to make this film even before his first two releases, but in the end had to wait three years before the camera’s finally rolled on this excellent piece of storytelling. Dolan had total control with everything planned, the great music, the editing, the beautifully composed camera work and how the actors should perform, a formula that is swiftly becoming this French-Canadian’s trademark. He also uses a similar cast in each of his movies, which brings continuity to his filmmaking.  The film features one of his regular actresses Suzanne Clement, from whom he extracts a fantastic emotive performance as Fred. Laurence is equally as well portrayed by the wonderful Melvil Poupaud, the more female his character gets the more you except him. Nathalie Baye is Laurence’s mother Julienne with another Dolan regular Monia Chokri as Fred’s sister Stefie and there’s even a small part for Anne Dorval.

 

Such a good looking couple. 

I can’t help but marvel at Xavier Dolan’s undeniable filmmaking skill, he must never compromises his unique talent and I would state that he is the best-unknown film director working in the movie industry at present. Hopefully his latest film Mommy (2014) will bring him the attention he so obviously deserves. I can say without doubt that this young man has not made a bad film to date. Most deal with what could be described by some as taboo subjects, with Dolan things that could be conceived as different, are treated as normal in such a way that the audience are invited to treat the subject the same way. Transsexuality is never an easy subject but films like this can broaden the outlook of a society that still in many ways does not except people of differing sexual preferences. The film is set in the 80's and 90's and we can see quite clearly how things have not changed that much!