Author: BRWC

Clone (or Womb as it was originally known before being retitled for it’s UK Home Cinema release) is a sci-fi drama starring Eva Green (from The Dreamers and Casino Royale) and Matt Smith (the hipster elephant man currently playing the latest incarnation of the much loved, but increasingly flogged dead horse, Dr Who). Set in a nondescript and stark seaside landscape, Clone follows the story of Tommy and Rebecca who having grown close as children are torn asunder when Rebecca’s parents move to Tokyo. Years later Rebecca returns and she and Tommy begin a relationship, only to be once again cut short by his death after being hit by a car. Distraught, Rebecca chooses to clone him (this is where the subtle sci-fi element comes in), giving birth to and raising a copy of her lover as her son.

Incestuous overtones aside, the movie is damned strange; it’s pace is slow, to the point of glacial, and almost all character interactions are portrayed with an uneasy tension that borders on instability. Each scene is a myriad of intentionally long gazes, and bizarre uncomfortable emptiness. Before his death, Tommy and Rebecca’s interactions are less like lovers and more like odd scenario’s in social awkwardness. Early on in the movie one character says the line “let’s play at being normal people” and, having brought up the perceived oddness of the characters, from thereon no one tries in the slightest to behave like ‘normal people’.

Having waited for 12 years to be reunited there’s an inherent tragedy in the short time the two main characters have together, but it’s rather extreme to simply grow a replacement, and raising a clone of a dead lover is ever so slightly twisted. There’s also a thinly veiled sexual tension existing through the relationship Rebecca has with clone Tommy who is simultaneously her son and her former lover, and bubbling beneath the surface of these tranquil yet oddly intense characters is the hint of deep instability. Inevitably the film culminates in an uncomfortable to watch incestuous love scene between Rebecca and the clone of Tommy.

Clone is a bleakly picturesque movie with plenty of long shots of beaches, water, sprawling natural landscapes that are interspersed throughout the sluggish, sparse melancholy of the narrative. There’s a constant feeling of isolation that is not only due to the apparent remoteness of the setting but also the vacant ambient soundscape. In a rather abstract way the movie brings up some interesting thoughts about cloning, human rights, family structure, etc, but does so in such a cold, emotionless way that it verges on clinical.

Above is the rather marvellously designed poster for the film, back before someone made the baffling decision to change the title into a contrivance. Perhaps Womb was phonetically too similar to Moon, a movie with which Clone not only shares the concept of human copying but also a constantly unsettling placidity and bizarreness.

Some very intense performances, not only from Green and Smith but from Lesley Manville and Peter Wright as Tommy’s parents, contribute to the overall atmosphere of unsettling oddness. Clone is interesting and at times beautifully executed but it’s slow and indirect pace makes it a chore to get through, although a haunting one at that.

Clone is available on Blu-Ray and DVD May 7.

Kinyarwanda is comprised of a series of short interconnected stories that weave through each other to tell a larger story of people living through, and after, the Rwandan genocide. Choosing to focus on the people and their relationships rather than telling a flat history of the genocide, Kinyarwanda is based on true events. The segments move forward and backwards between people and times, breaking up the linearity of narrative and so slowly what builds is a sense of an overall story as the interrelated nature of all the story elements becomes clearer.

One of Kinyarwanda’s first lines of dialogue is “the funny thing about genocide is…”, the irony of course being that there is nothing funny about genocide. This moving has a powerful subject and is frequently quite distressing, but by focussing on the people in this situation rather than directly on politics or ideologies it manages to be a moving portrayal of a horrific event. For those unaware the Rwandan genocide occurred in 1994 when between an estimated 500,000 and 1,000,000 Tutsi people were killed by the ruling Hutu Rwandan regime in a period spanning approximately 100 days. The movie largely takes place during that time, but with some sequences taking place afterwards in ‘Re-eduKation Camp’ where those who took part in the killings must come to terms with what they’ve done.

There’s a tale of forbidden love between Hutu and Tutsi, Muslims and Christians putting aside religious or ethnic concerns to stand up for all people’s rights, stories of families and children, and also soldiers fighting to free people from oppression. All undeniably powerful subjects. As a movie though it’s somewhat hard going (and not just because of the difficult subject), it has a very somber pace and the cast is mixed between professionals and first-time actors leading to an overall uneven calibre of acting. That being said, if you stick with it the stories of these people begin to combine into something that’s very compelling in it’s intensity.

Some of the vignettes prevail more so, whilst others contribute only a little to the overall picture. The story between the Muslim Imam and the Catholic Priest stands out as being the most prescient and moving, whilst the stories told by the Hutus in the re-education camp are the most haunting and disturbing of the narrative mosaic. It’s thought provoking and illuminating to anyone who knows little on the subject of the genocides, perhaps even to those that do. Kinyarwanda builds to be hugely moving but at times is very dry and hard going, it’s relevance falls somewhere between the truth of the stories and it’s focus on the humanity of a subject not often discussed.

Kinyarwanda is available May through Breaking Glass Pictures.

After years of planning, and sneaking in tidbits at the end of movies, Marvel’s movie roadmap meets it’s convergence point in The Avengers (or in this country The Avengers Assemble, a title I refuse to use) as all of the previously depicted superhero’s are mashed together in one big hulking, action packed, film. I had more than a little reservation about this movie; I’m a fan of the Marvel universe, I love the Iron Man movies, and whilst Thor and Captain America were flawed they were at least fun. So how will a movie with all of those big characters (and stars), along with the Hulk, Black Widow, and Hawkeye, manage not to get tangled or bloated? Well the answer is damn well brilliantly. The Avengers may be the best comic book adaptation ever made, and one of the best blockbuster action movies for some time.

The story begins by setting up the antagonist and the principle plot; Loki, last seen in Thor tumbling off into space now guided by some yet unidentified alien bad guys, comes to earth to enslave the human race by using the power of the tesseract (blue glowing cube from Captain America, and the post-credit sequence of Thor) to open a door way to allow his army of new friends in. Cue fights, explosions, the destruction of the S.H.I.E.L.D. base and one mightily pissed off Samuel L. Jackson (Nick Fury). From here Fury assemble’s a team of available heroes, plans to use the smarts of Tony Stark and Bruce Banner to track the tesseract and stop Loki’s evil scheme

Directed by Joss Whedon (hot off his clever and crazy The Cabin in the Woods), this movie is a prime example of what happens if you give a movie to someone who has reverence for the source material, is aware of the movies that have already been made, but is willing to really sink his teeth into it. For all of the large characters none of them pull focus over the others and yet each has their fair share of moments, the movie flows between the characters various scenes and in particular at the end action sequence there’s a beautiful shot that flows through each of them fighting in turn. The story moves forward at a quick pace, but is not rushed and takes time to explain and expand on what it needs to. Whedon has also made sure the film is very well shot, take notice of the constant use of reflective surfaces and mirrors to frame characters – the effect is straight out of a comic book page.

The Avengers is also surprisingly hilarious; there are moments of riotous comedy in the interactions between all these heroes that wonderfully break up what could have been a movie that takes itself too seriously or puts each character on a pedestal. Tony Stark is his usual witty, sardonic self. Captain America is the same boorish, tiresome goody goody that he always is. Thor is the bulging demigod coming to terms with his siblings messianic tendencies and murderous rampage. The Hulk steals the show with some of the best action punch lines. Black Widow is fantastically manipulative. And Hawkeye completes the gang as a kind of weak link, he’s a damned good shot with a bow, but Jeremy Renner is just a bit of a wooden actor. As the antagonist Loki is a brilliant, egotistical enemy, whose need for pageantry and drama make him the perfect showgirl.

There’s plenty of bulging, bounding, exploding action as the gang of disparate misfit ego’s learn how to work as a team rather than a bunch of moody teenagers (admittedly they would have to be genius, steroid ridden teenagers) in order to thwart the lank haired, moody eyed, spoilt drama queen Loki. The final action sequence set in Manhattan is a stunning accomplishment of CGI and looks fantastic in 3D. If you like 3D this uses it well. If you don’t like 3D see it in 2D, the movie will hold up just as well.

It might seem like I’m merely gushing praise for The Avengers, and its true I am, but I was genuinely impressed with it, much more so that I had thought. The few gripes I have with it are minor, as in really minor, 30 seconds of tacky background score here or a couple of off lines there – they’re inconsequential to the whole. I’m sure some people might attack some elements as being too fantastical, but I just don’t see that – you’re watching a movie about super hero’s… In that context, everything in this movie is not only believable but expected.

The ending obviously sets itself up for a sequel, with almost every character also having forthcoming solo sequels (Captain America 2, Thor 2, Iron Man 3…), and considering how much fun I had watching this I’m looking forward to it so lets hope that Whedon returns for that as well. The Avengers combines so many massive personalities into a truly entertaining spectacle, one that is improved by the time taken to set up the characters in their own movies. It might even rival Iron Man or The Dark Knight for best comic book movie adaptation. Go and see this movie.

The Avengers is in theatres from today.

Gone is the latest film to star doe eyed, vacant, closeted psycho Amanda Seyfried… Wait maybe that’s a bit harsh. Seyfried, who was pretty fantastic in Chloe and unbearably awful in Red Riding Hood, stars as Jill in this run of the mill psychological thriller. Having supposedly been kidnapped two years prior, Jill comes home to find her sister, Molly, missing and proceeds directly to panic with the belief that she has been kidnapped by the same person, much to the disbelief of the police who didn’t even believe Jill’s first kidnapping was real.

Since no one else seems bothered about Molly (she has a drinking problem so presumably her being on a bender is far more likely than the kidnap story concocted by kooky big eyes) Jill ramps up the crazy to unnecessary levels, inciting police car chases and firing guns in local hardware stores, in the pursuit of her sister. The story doesn’t hang around, I lost count of the amount of car’s that she goes through as she investigates tenuous leads on the kidnapper who may or may not exist (that’s an exaggeration, it was only 3 cars).

Gone is one of those films that spends the preponderance of it’s time making you wonder what is real and what is in the characters mind, and as such it is rife with a truck load of red herrings, completely superfluous pieces of information, and characters that will act in an incomprehensibly bizarre manner intended to fool you into making false assumptions about the plot and where it is heading. This is both entertaining (to a point) and infuriating. A good thriller would create suspense and use subtlety to generate mystery and intrigue in the plot, Gone chooses the approach that if the plot is saturated with an endless series of irritating possibilities then chances are you won’t be able to guess what’s about to happen.

It’s not that the film is awful, it’s short enough not to labour the point and the constant “is it real, is it in her mind, who could the kidnapper be?” continuum does keep you guessing. Which is why, when it’s all revealed, it’s slightly disappointing that it’s almost completely unexplored, as if the entire thing had no motivation whatsoever. There’s a brief and somewhat satisfyingly harsh ending, even if it is all left a bit unexplained.

Seyfried is OK, she oozes a kind of unstable nature that fits the part, and she creates wonderful lies at the drop of a hat to suit pretty much any scenario. With a better story backing her up she really could have shined in this, but as it stands the story isn’t anything special and neither is the film as a whole. Another one of those “if it comes on give it a go, but don’t seek it out especially” movies.

Gone is in theatres now.

I’ll admit it, I’m not exactly what you would call a Bruce Lee fan. In fact I don’t think I’ve ever actually watched a Bruce Lee film.

Despite that I loved every minute of this documentary.

Directed by Pete McCormack, the film follows Lee’s life story from a child star in Hong Kong to the international superstar he became.

Featuring a number of interviews with the man himself as well as his family, the film paints a deep, multilayered portrait of a man caught between the East and the West.

It was remarkable to see how articulate and philosophical Bruce could be, particularly in his interview with Pierre Berton (where the famous ‘be water’ speech comes from, see- Bruce Lee – Pierre Berton interview) and a further revelation to find that he in fact taught Chinese philosophy at an American high school.

The range of talking heads appearing in the documentary is a testament to just how much Lee has influenced modern culture. MMA fighters (including ‘Haywire’ star Gina Carano), Taboo from the Black Eyed Peas, Kobe Bryant, Mickey Rourke and cultural theorists like Cardiff University’s Paul Bowman all weigh in on the wider significance of the man and his work while the more personal side of the legend is filled in by his widow Linda and his daughter Shannon.

McCormack’s direction brings a pace and vitality that is only appropriate given the subject matter, the use of captions and quotations throughout the film is edited expertly, words appear on screen; sharp, bold and only for a second, mimicking Lee’s own lightning fast reactions.

Weather or not you have any interest in Bruce Lee, I would urge you to seek this out. To many he is an icon emblazoned on t-shirts, shouting in a high pitched voice with a pair of Nunchucks. In reality the man was an incredible athlete, teacher and role model who spanned cultural and ethnic gaps throughout the world.

No matter what level of your Lee knowledge I Am Bruce Lee will engage, inform and above all entertain.