film reviews, interviews, features | BRWC

Author: BRWC

  • James Bond After Daniel Craig?

    James Bond After Daniel Craig?

    James Bond. Who Can Step Up To The Mantle Of James Bond After Daniel Craig?

    If there’s one thing that James Bond beats like he beats his enemies, it’s age. His liver doesn’t seem to resent all the martinis and whiskies; his lungs don’t bother about the endless cigars. He still has money for high stakes on blackjack and roulette at the world’s most lavish and exotic casinos. 

    Born from the imagination of the former intelligence officer Ian Fleming, Bond keeps getting new faces. Indeed, he didn’t retire after his creator’s passing. Agent 007 premiered on the big screen with his sixth novel, Dr No, in 1963. The first book, Casino Royale (1952), only became a movie in 2006, with Daniel Craig, who’s been playing Mr Bond ever since. However, the times are coming for a new face in MI6. Who’d that be?

    Fleming’s Legacy

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    Pixabay

    Ian Fleming (1908 – 1964) wrote two compilations of short stories, plus twelve James Bond novels. He worked in the Naval Intelligence Division during World War II. A journalist by profession, Mr Fleming’s writings were greatly influenced by this period. He wrote all the books between 1952 and 1964 when he died. Two other posthumous works were published in 1964. 

    Other writers picked up the agent from where Fleming had left him and carried on. Ten authors have contributed to Mr Bond’s adventures ever since. John Gardner was the most prolific, with 14 novels and two novelizations. It means that Agent 007 will never run out of stories on the big screen. 

    Times of Change

    Daniel Craig is playing the secret agent for the last time in No Time to Die, coming out next October. While there’s no official information regarding Craig’s replacement, it’s all open for speculation. Some bookies have even opened the subject for bets. Since Barbara Broccoli stated that the next 007 wouldn’t be female, here are a few possible names for the job. 

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    Pixabay

    Tom Hardy

    Tom Hardy is one of the greatest talents of his generation. Moreover, he would suit quite well the cold attitude of Agent 007. In 2020, a blog “announced” that Tom Hardy was “officially” the new James Bond. In the end, it was all a hoax, but the actor did little to dispel the rumours. He said he wouldn’t comment about it because of an “old superstition” among actors, which tells the one who comments on Bond rumours are out of the game. 

    Idris Elba

    Idris Elba made fame and fans by starring in the BBC series Luther. His name keeps coming up in front-runner lists for the role. Barbara Broccoli once said that it was time for a “non-white” actor to play the part. Like the fictional character, he’s tall, athletic, and charming. Elba has proven his talent many times over and is the favourite choice for many critics and fans.

    Michael Fassbender

    The actor stays in the bookies, even after insisting he would never play James Bond. Daniel Craig said the same thing, and here we are. He’s also a great actor, with experience in action movies, and it’s still in the game, it seems.

    Conclusion

    Honestly, we couldn’t possibly mention all the suitable candidates for the gig. Yet, we can expect to be surprised. After all these years, James Bond never lost.

  • Philophobia (As I Am): Review

    Philophobia (As I Am): Review

    Philophobia: Review. By Alif Majeed.

    As I was about to start Philophobia, also known as As I Am, I tried to figure out the general cliches regarding coming-of-age movies with a male protagonist. Since many of them follow a particular template, I thought it would be fun trying to figure it out. 

    Off the top of my head, I figured the top 5 would be:

    1. A sensitive protagonist who is more often than not a would-be writer who others often have to remind that he is way too good for the town

    2. Said protagonist always seems to have trouble at his house, which affects his general behavior

    3. A lady-love who has way more guts than said protagonist but whom he pines for but often loses her to the local bad boy, who can be dangerously close to being termed a psychopath

    4. A group of friends who often work hard to get into trouble and are hell-bent on getting him into trouble too. In the end, all they want is some harmless fun, but if it is a drama, this will inevitably spell disaster for at least some of them 

    5. A sympathetic elder character who might also often be their teacher who understands their need to get into trouble whom people might also hold responsible for the kids getting into trouble.

    With that in mind, I started watching the movie and slowly realized it checks off all the cliches mentioned above on my list. It is a movie that hardly rises above the stereotypes the genre entails. It adds nothing new to the canon of the coming-of-age genre. Which is not required, but that makes it look like a by-the-numbers coming-of-age flick.

    Now it’s not bad by any measure and actually looks pretty great. Everyone who has worked on the movie also seems to have put a lot of work into it. Sadly, their efforts come undone as it is the writing that ultimately lets the film down.

    The actors also do their bit to elevate the material as they create some lovely character moments. There is a scene where Kai, the main character (Joshua Glenister) walks in on Grace (Kim Spearman), his crush having sex with the town bully Kenner (Alex Lincoln), with whom she has an on-off relationship. The reactions of the three actors also make you playback that disturbing scene in your mind, trying to figure out what is the degree of consent or choice in those situations if there is any. 

    The character of Kenner and Alex’s portrayal of him are also something that also stayed with me. He knows he is an asshole and has no qualms about admitting it. He also acknowledges Jason is a better person than him, and he keeps bullying him for not taking charge of his life. Imagine if Ben Affleck was a massive dick in Good Will Hunting.

    By the time the movie got over, you hope that the film might follow a different trajectory from the usual coming-of-age arc. But you realize that is not so, as the movie slowly trudges to its predictable ending. Pity because it is a well-shot and well-acted movie otherwise.

  • Martin Eden: Review

    Martin Eden: Review

    Martin Eden: Review. By Alex Crisp.

    An Italian adaptation of Jack London’s eponymous novel, built around a ‘we-come-from-different-worlds’ romance. It follows parvenu author Martin Eden’s journey from rags to riches in the febrile political climate of pre-WW2 Italy, and his passionate love-affair with an aristocrat’s daughter.  Sounds like stirring stuff, but it’s marred by shoddy filmmaking.

    Rhythm matters. Action, romance, comedy, all films and all genres are married to our pulses by editing. When those rhythms are disrupted unintentionally, it’s jolting. The editing here shunts regular beats off-centre, belying a lack of rigour in the production process. Beyond that, director Pietro Marcello employs a pair of aggressively arty devices that are always an eye-jab. Uno: annoying, unnecessary POV shots. This isn’t Silence of the Lambs. Due: Marcello’s framing of flashbacks. I appreciate they require a differentiating visual cue — audiences have to know what is and isn’t in the present. Changing shades of monochrome however? Pick a colour that fits and stick with it.

    Accompanying the muddle in the direction is the chosen potpourri of musical styles, with musak, classical preludes and euro-pop all coming, clashing, coming again, and going. In a longer movie with more distance between scenes, they might have separated out into constituent parts. Indeed, it feels odd to characterise a 2-hour film as rushed. This contains the material for a sweeping epic, and 128 minutes isn’t enough to realise it —instead the narrative is inimically foreshortened. Take Martin Eden’s character development in the final act, for instance. The guy goes through one bad break-up and turns into a bohemian emo, and he gets one book deal and transforms from a pauper into a superstar. Both of these concomitant changes take place without a single coordinating scene.  

    Ultimately then, the erudite screenplay that thrusts Jack London’s early-20th century political philosophy into cinema, ends up being an interesting footnote to those drawbacks, rather than the film’s centrepiece. There’s a whole other essay to be written on the debates about individualism, collectivism, romanticism, laissez-faire, and everything in-between that it attempts to convey. Short of wherewithal though, this is the essay that was demanded. The troubled writer stalking Martin Eden would understand that.   

  • Dr. Bird’s Advice For Sad Poets: Review

    Dr. Bird’s Advice For Sad Poets: Review

    Dr. Bird’s Advice For Sad Poets: Review. By Alex Crisp.

    James Whitman is a tremulous teen with a difficult home-life, a crush on the cutest girl in school, and a mysteriously vanished sister. He talks to an imaginary psychiatrist because his father doesn’t believe he’s mentally ill, therefore refusing to pay for him to see an actual one. All of these threads inform a manic, overstuffed comedy-drama that’s never sure what it wants to be.                 

    Performance-wise, most commendable is Tom Wilkinson, whose avuncular warmth makes Dr. Bird—the imaginary psychiatrist who also happens to be a pigeon—the most real character in the film. Jason Isaacs showcases his talent for accents as Whitman’s father, and Lucas Jade Zumann, playing the teenaged James Whitman, does what I’d describe as a pretty good Woody Allen impression during the first act. Allen’s directorial mien is also the touchstone for director Yaniv Raz’s approach here, but unlike Allen, Raz displays a complete lack of discipline and self-control—someone has let him play in the Microsoft video-editor sandbox without supervision. The rapidity of kooky cuts, visual tricks and editing folderol turns the viewing experience into a ride on a demented merry-go-round, and not in a good way.

    So the direction lets the comedy down, and the screenplay lets the drama down too. The final act leaves the fun-park behind, delving deeper into the mystery of Whitman’s missing sister. That mystery has a prosaic resolution, but the simplicity isn’t reflected in the writing. Dialogue can only handle so much plot before the plot starts to drown the words, and that’s what happens in Whitman’s closing exchanges with his family.

    It’s in these exchanges that Dr Bird’s essential theme is rammed home. The troubled teenager realises he has to change his equally troubled family’s outdated attitudes towards mental illness. The teen’s father suffers from the same panic-problems that he does, but is misunderstood because of his anger. There’s nothing wrong with those ideas, they just fall flat for lack of craft. Such misgivings might be redundant though. Yaniv Raz’s gimmickry is so distracting that it would’ve be impossible to ignore however good the screenplay was. The serendipitous outcome is that Raz didn’t spoil a better one than this.

  • Two Hands: Review

    Two Hands: Review

    Two Hands: Review. By Sharmin Paynter.

    Guy Ritchie’s 1998 genre-bender, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, might have inspired a wave of late 90s comedy crime films. But for every Lock Stockmob boss, flash of ultraviolence, and multiple or intersecting storyline, Gregor Jordan’s 1999 debut Two Hands confidently goes toe to toe. Superficial similarities are obvious: Lock Stock’s Eddy owes £500,000 to mobster Hatchet Harry; Hands’ Jimmy owes $10,000 to gangster boss Pando. When it comes down to the wire, it’s the hyper-Aussie vernacular that makes Hands uniquely endearing. 

    Hands is named after charming protagonist 19-year-old Jimmy (Heath Ledger), who isn’t sure what he wants to do in life – maybe ‘something with his hands’. The flick opens with the ghost of Jimmy’s brother (‘The Man’) who philosophises to the audience about life, death, and fate. Then we’re introduced to Jimmy, who’s facing execution at the hands of frustrated mob boss Pando (Bryan Brown). In true crime flick style, chronology is thrown to the wind as we rewind to find out why Pando’s so pissed. We see Jimmy working at a Kings Cross club, and two life-changing events start to unfold. Pando asks him to do a job; and a friend introduces him to baby-faced bottle-blonde Alex (Rose Byrne). Jimmy bumps into Alex the next day on his way to see Pando.

    Alex is taking photos with her Minolta SLR. When he offers to take her picture, she smoulders through the lens and disarms him completely. Later in Pando’s office, Jimmy’s instructed to take a car and deliver $10,000 of hot cash to a contact in Bondi. But it’s not just any car. It’s a purple XA GT Ford hardtop that belongs to Acko, Pando’s number two guy. When the contact doesn’t answer the door, Jimmy heads to the beach. He thinks he can see Alex in the water, so he buries the cash in the sand while he goes swimming. Unfortunately for Jimmy, two street kids Pete (Evan Sheaves) and Helen (Mariel McClorey) nab the cash, and someone steals the GT.  

    Many of the characters in Hands have two sides, but Acko’s an exception. After he gets a call to retrieve his distinctive GT from a mechanic workshop, he drives there in a rage and runs Pete down. Acko only stops to check the damage to the borrowed car, and to move Pete’s body out of his path. As a result, the shellshocked Helen is bent on revenge. Her story isn’t as littered with humour, chase scenes, or romance as Jimmy’s. Jordan added flame effects in her eyes to symbolise her bad choices – not that she had many good choices available to start with. But he didn’t need to bother with the effects. McClorey’s eyes burned fiercely enough on their own. In contrast to Acko, Pando has a kind heart. He’s a caring father figure who makes origami with his son. He gives Alex taxi money to get home after ordering a hit on Jimmy. And he appreciates a good love song (The Reels’ version of This Guy’s In Love With You), even on the way to an execution. But Acko represents the worst part of Pando. He’s not redeemable because he killed Pete, but neither is the Australia that didn’t notice or care about Pete’s welfare. Despite this, Jordan does give him some humanity when he plays chess and Scrabble with Pando (see Acko’s gobsmacked face at Pando’s winning move). 

    Thanks to Hands’ focus on ephemeral objects of the 90s – Kings Cross streetscapes, now-vintage cigarette packets, house and pub décor, and telephones – the film generates a powerful sense of nostalgia when viewed today. The ensemble cast represent a 90s Australiana culture fascinated with collector cars, but on the cusp of embracing emerging technologies like the mobile phone. Les, Jimmy’s colleague, uses the mobile phone clipped on his belt to lag on Jimmy, but he hasn’t charged it for long enough. The flat battery beeps at him and incites a confused rage. He resorts to a Telstra phone booth, robbing a busker to pay for the call – but the busker exacts his revenge in style. While Jimmy pleads his innocence to Pando, Acko uses his mobile to speak with an operator and verify Jimmy’s alibi, but they can’t find the person who can attest to his story. Nowadays we’d probably quiz them via Facebook. It’s during this scene that Acko reveals it was he and Pando who killed Jimmy’s brother, fueling Jimmy’s desperate rage to escape their grip on his life. 

    Jordan nods to Australia’s obsession with Holden cars against Ford in the third act, when Jimmy decides to rob a bank to repay Pando. His sister-in-law, Deirdre, introduces him to nice-guy crims, Wozza and Craig. During their rendezvous at Deirdre’s mum’s house to plan the heist, Jordan shows us a suburban front yard decorated with classic Holdens: a HQ Statesman, a HT Monaro, an A9X-style LX hatch and a VL Walkinshaw. It’s clear that while characters can have good and bad traits, they can only drive one type of car. In Hands, the ‘good’ guys drive Holdens, and the bad guys drive Fords. However the robbery fails in comical style.

    Police shoot at the getaway car, so the boys steal a businessman’s Toyota Celica. Ironically the Celica is selected for a $10,000 radio station cash prize and approached by the radio station’s car, a Nissan Pathfinder. By this stage Jimmy’s had it with the criminal life and takes it out on the unsuspecting radio team. He hotfoots it to Pando’s with his share of the loot to repay the debt, but he can barely contain his rage and despair over losing his brother. Both he and Helen are tempted to exact the kind of justice that the villains deserve – but that nobody benefits from dishing out. And that’s where Jordan leaves them – accepting that they each have to live with the choices they make.