The Lobster.

I agree with Peter Bradshaw when he writes that The Lobster (2015) “appears to run out of idea’s at its mid point”[1] It’s a film of two halves the first holds your attention but the second half can not be accused of the same.  The films turning point comes when the main character escapes the confines of the hotel and joins the loners in the woods. This dark dystopian satire is the work of Greek born Yorgos Lanthimos who has directed and produced some of the most atypical but enjoyable movies of the last few years including the chilling fairy tale Dogtooth in 2009 which deservedly won the Prix Un Certain Regard at 2009’s Cannes Film Festival, the strangely watchable Alps in 2011 and also worked as co producer on the appealing Attenberg (2010) one of Movie Rambles most blogged movies. As is quite normal with films that involve Lanthimos the synopsis makes strange reading….

 

David with the Lisping Man and the Limping Man.

Sexual relief can only be administered by the Maid.

It’s the present, we are somewhere in a mysterious Europe country. David’s (Colin Farrell) wife has left him and we find him in a hotel where the rules state that if you don’t find a compatible ‘mate’ within 45 days you will be turned into an animal of your choice, in David’s case a lobster. David is there with his brother who has previously been turned into a dog. The Hotel Manager (Olivia Colman) sets the rules and they must be obeyed. Sexual relief by masturbation is not allowed but sexual stimulation by the hotel Maid (Ariane Labed) is. Dances are arranged so that partners can be viewed but to form a qualifying partnership with someone you must have something in common with each other. Everyone can extend their stay affording extra time to find a partner by hunting and tranquilizing escapees known as Loners who live in the nearby woods.  David decides to escape from the hotel and join the band of Loners lead by Loner Leader (Lea Seydoux). Here in the woods the rules are different. Above all they must remain single, romance and sex in any form is not allowed. Deviation from the rules is punishable by violence. 

 

Davids getting to know the Nosebleed Women....

....before joining the Loners and disobeying their rules.

You would certainly have to see the film to understand Lanthimos’s script and even then the movie probable requires more than a single viewing to fully understand the intricacies of this strangely hypnotic story.  The film has a great cast list, as well as these already mentioned it includes Rachel Weisz as the Short Sighted Woman, the lovely Jessica Barden as the Nosebleed Woman, Ben Whishaw as the Limping Man and old friend of Movie Ramble Michael Smiley as Loner Swimmer. Of all the films involving Yorgos Lanthimos that I have seen this is not his best work, interesting but not quite up there with his previous movies. It’s a real shame that the second half of the film was not as good as the first or it could have been one of his best outings.

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[1] The Guardian 18^th May 2015.

Seven Psychopaths

Martin McDonagh’s film making career has moved to Hollywood after the triumph of In Bruges (2008), which in its self followed the success of his Award winning short film Six Shooter (2004). In Bruges was a film where you could not help laughing out loud at some very brutal scenes made even funnier by the non stop banter between two hit men holed up in the Belgium town to await there next assignment after a contract killing goes horribly wrong. The 27 minute short Six Shooter is about a middle-aged male who encounters a strange young man, possible psychotic, during a homeward train journey following his wife’s death.

 

Give the bloody dog back.......

Made in Hollywood, but apparently founded by in the UK Seven Psychopaths (2012) is not your standard gangster shoot out movie, more a lesson on how not to write a film script! Blocked screenwriter and self confessed alcoholic Marty (Colin Farrell) is tasked with preparing a screenplay for a movie, the only thing he has at present is the title, ‘Seven Psychopaths’, written on the first page of his foolscap note pad. Marty, a peace loving man at heart, knows nothing about the aggressive people who commit violent acts without a shred of remorse. To this end Marty’s friend Billy, an out of work actor, played by Sam Rockwell who makes the most of McDonough quick fire script, agrees to help. Unbeknown to our Irish writer Billy is mixed up with a dognapping business run by Hans (Christopher Walken) a rather dapper gentleman whose wife is in hospital with suspected cancer. The ever-resourceful Billy places an advert in a newspaper asking for psycho’s to come forward if they have stories to tell, ideally giving Marty some background for his screenplay. From this advert we hear (and see) stories about some unlikely people like the Quaker, a brilliant cameo from Harry Dean Stanton, who is prepared to hunt a man, into hell if necessary, he believes raped and murdered his daughter: a Vietnamese monk who has swore revenge against America for the their mass murder of over 400 people at My Lai in 1968 and rabbit loving Zachariah and his partner Maggie (Tom Waits and Amanda Warren) who spent their younger days ‘going round the country killing people going round the country killing people’ i.e. serial killers of serial killers.  Every thing seems to be going jolly well until Billy and Hans kidnap the wrong dog, a shih tzw called Bonny whose identity tag reads ‘Return to Charlie Costello or you will fucking die’ Costello is a psychopathic gangster whose love for his wee pooch borders on the unwholesome. As you would now expect things now go from bad to worse!

 

Charlie and Han's face off in the hospital.

Tarantino is obviously an influence in a film that attempts to send it, and Hollywood genre pictures, up. The experienced English cinematographer Ben Davis makes a good job of photographing both the city of Los Angles and the wide-open spaces of California’s Joshua Tree National Park. The first part of the film is excellent and full of promise but it does lose its momentum the more the film goes on and as Robbie Collin said in the Daily Telegraph’s review ‘self-aware stupidity does not equal wit.’ In other words Martin McDonagh’s writing is not as clever as he thinks it is.

 

Tom Waits has not normally got a lot of 'rabbit'?

The Way Back

Watching over the "enemies" of the people.

Monday night’s film was the reconstruction of a road trip, albeit on foot, starting in Siberia and ending in India, a journey described by Polish exile Slavomir Rawicz in his “memoir” The Long Walk written in 1953. The journey takes place over a 12-month period and tells how he and some fellow prisoners escaped from a Siberian Gulag prison camp in 1940 during World War Two and trekked 4000 miles to freedom via Mongolia, the Gobi Desert, Tibet and across the Himalayas into India. Although the authenticity of his story has been cast into doubt by some recent research, Rawicz was released under an amnesty in 1942 and rejoined the Polish army.  It has been suggested that someone must have completed the journey even if it was not the author of the book.

If these barrows get any bigger?

The Way Back (2010) Peter Weir’s first film since Master and Commander (2003) is far too long, it requires a harsher edit! The first 40 minutes in the camp and the initial part of their journey are the strongest and most thrilling segments. Weir’s film changed pace when the services of the gangster escapee Valka, superbly played by Colin Farrell, departed at the Russian-Mongolian border. The group was joined by a young female refugee for no other reason (as far as I could see) than to extend the narrative ploy to give our one-dimensional characters some back-story. Once the travelers reached the desert the film descended into predictability and petered out with a typical American anticlimactic ending. 

Crazy Heart

The usual suspects stayed behind at the RBC Film club on Monday evening to discuss, amongst other things, Crazy Heart (2009). Directed by Scott Cooper it’s the story of a broken down alcoholic country and western entertainer who attempts to turn his life around after beginning a relationship with a young journalist and her four year old son. Cooper initially wanted to do a biopic on Merle Haggard but encountered problems getting the rights to the story. Instead he adapted the 1987 novel of the same name by Thomas Cobb, allegedly based on the life story of Hank Thomson an American country star whose career spanned seven decades and who sold 60 million records worldwide. 60 year-old Jeff Bridges plays 56 year-old, four times married, Bad Blake, a man with a 28 year-old son whom he has not seen since the lad was four. Other than the occasionally poorly paid gig his current life consists of whisky and a string of one-night stands with his middle-aged fan base. The director built the film around Bridges and was justly rewarded for his efforts with the star turning in a magnificent performance that’s totally convincing. The movie also stars Maggie Gyllenhaal as Jean Craddock, Blake’s reason for living. Robert Duvall is a Houston bar owner and Bad Blake’s confident and great friend. Colin Farrell plays Blake’s former protégé, Tommy Sweet, the current toast of Nashville. With music being a very important part of the narrative T-Bone Burnett, who has contributed musically to many films including producing the original music for O Brother Where Art Thou (2000) and Walk the Line (2005)’ shared the Academy Award with Ryan Bingham for the Best Original Song The Weary Kind. With a conventional plot and fairly obvious ending this back to basics film is arguable The Wrestler to music but as Philip French summed up in his recent critique ‘the movie had dramatic fibre and a sense of lived in experience’ quite right Philip.