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'?

A Late Quartet.

Written and directed by American Yaron Silberman whose only previous screen work was an award-winning documentary called Watermarks made in 2004. It related the true story of the Hokoah Vienna Jewish women’s swim team of the 1930’s, their forced separation and their reunion decades later. His first feature film is A Late Quartet (2012), a colourful interpretation of four classical musicians who over the years have grown to rely on each other far too much, and like the preverbal pack of cards, when one falls the others will follow.

The Fugue String Quartet is internationally acclaimed, based in New York they have been playing classical music together for 25 years. The four members consist of cellist Peter Mitchell (Christopher Walken in an unfamiliar role that takes some getting use to) a quiet man whose life has been affected by the recent death of his concert-singing wife from cancer. The second violinist is Robert Gelbert  (Philip Seymour Hoffman) whose ambition to be first violinist has never been fulfilled. He’s married to the quartet’s viola player Juliette (the always superb Catherine Keener) who have been together since their student days. The 40-year-old couple have a daughter Alex (Imogen Poots) who is also a student of music and plays the violin. The fourth member of the quartet is the technically brilliant first violinist Daniel Lerner (Mark Ivanir) an intense man who also teaches Alex violin.

 

Christopher Walken as Peter Mitchell.

Peter announces he has been diagnosed with early signs of Parkinson’s disease a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that in due course will end his ability to play music. This bombshell throws the remaining members of the quartet in to disarray leading them to question their fears, hopes and futures. 

This intelligent film starts rather slowly but eventually when it kicks into emotional overdrive it does take off.  The acting is first rate as you would expect from a high-powered ensemble cast and for lovers of Beethoven’s Op 131 for String Quartet this is defiantly your movie. The cinematography of Frederick Elmes, who was responsible for the camera work in Coffee and Cigarettes (2003), is the real star of the film highlighting the beauty of mid winter in New Yorks Central Park and contrasting this with the warmth and splendor of the interior shots. 

New Yorks Central Park in winter.

Heavens Gate.

Its not often that the sheer brilliance of a movie makes you want weep with joy, please don’t let anyone tell you that Michael Cimino’s Heavens Gate (1980) is not a masterpiece, because they would be lying! 

This giant of cinematic history was much maligned on its release. Originally it was considered to be one of the biggest box office flops of all time, costing in the region of $44 million and allegedly earning less than $3 million dollars in return. It brought its studio, United Artist, to near collapse and destroyed the career of an award-winning director. United Artist had given Cimino a free hand after the success of 1978’s The Deer Hunter but never again allowed a director driven film production! Problems with budgetary overspends, originally in the region of $11.4 million, time overruns, the planned release was for December 1979 but did not open until November the following year, and bad press added to its problems.

Written and directed by Michael Cimino its gripping narrative is really another demonstration of man’s inhumanity to his fellow man, a story about capitalism and greed and ethnic cleansing, showing the America system at its worse? The Wyoming Stock Growers association lead by Frank Canton is convinced the European immigrant settlers are looting their herds of cattle. Gaining the approval of the state, Canton and his fellow cattlemen draw up a death list with a 125 names of settlers from Johnston County who are accused of being thieves and anarchists.

The beautiful cinematography.........

The film boasts a well-known cast that includes Kris Kristofferson as Jim Averill an 1870 graduate of Harvard College who 20 years later finds himself the Marshall of Johnson County. A fair man who has no time for the cattleman’s association preferring the company of Ella Watson a Johnson County bordello madam who accepts cattle as payment for use of her prostitutes. Depicted, in her American feature film debut, by French superstar Isabelle Huppert. Watson also shares her affections with Nate Champion a friend of Averill and an enforcer for the stockmen who is portrayed in his normal laid back style by Christopher Walken. Also included in the cast are Jeff Bridges, Mickey Rourke, a very young looking John Hurt and Sam Waterston as the evil Frank Canton.

and the wonderful set pieces...........

The 2013 Glasgow Film Festival showed the restored version of the film, the 216-minute directors cut and not the massacred cut of 149 minutes. Released in 2012 and first shown at the 69^th Venice Film Festival and subsequently at the New York Film Festival it now clearly demonstrates the stunning cinematography, the wonderfully choreographed set pieces and a sound that is incredible. The critics had finally woken up to the fact that it was “one of the few authentically innovative Hollywood films[1]” This “wounded monster” as David Thomson called it has found its rightful place up there among the great films of all time and finally been given the credit a film of this stature disserves.

make this one of the finest films your ever have the privilege of watching. 

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[1] Robin Wood 1986.