Disney’s live-action version of Mulan charges straight to Number 1 on the Official Film Chart.
The film enters the Official Film Chart after becoming available for purchase on physical and digital download formats – it was originally available to watch via Premier Access on Disney+ this summer, in lieu of a wider cinematic release due to the pandemic. Disney’s Mulan stars Yifei Liu as the eponymous character, who disguises herself as a male soldier in order to save her ailing father (Tzi Ma) from being conscripted.
Last week’s Number 1 Last Christmas drops to Number 2 and is the first of several Christmas entries on this week’s chart. Much-loved comedy Elf flies up 12 places to Number 3, and Jim Carrey’s classic portrayal of The Grinch re-enters the chart at Number 9. Further up the Top 20, The Polar Express (15) and Love Actually (16) are also back in the Top 20 as viewers gear up for the festive season.
1917 returns to the Top 10, climbing nine places to Number 4, while Frozen 2 drops to Number 5. Star Wars: The Force Awakens enters the Top 10 at Number 6 following a new 4K re-release, as Onward drops to 7.
Dolittle starring Robert Downey Jr. zooms up 25 places to Number 8, and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker rounds off this week’s Top 10 at Number 10.
On this week’s Official Film Chart online show, catch a preview of Russell Crowe in action-thriller Unhinged, which is available to Download & Keep from November 23.
Now, as well as OfficialCharts.com, the Official Film Chart can also be found on FindAnyFilm.com – the ultimate site for Film and TV fans to discover all the legal ways to buy the entertainment they want on disc and digital formats. Make sure to keep an eye out for all of these great titles over the next few months.
The Official Film Chart Top 10 – 18th November 2020
I was recently reading an old interview of Kristen Wiig’s where she said what studios need is, “to see women acting like guys.” Growing up, watching TV was very limited as we often had to fight with our sister for our time on the television. Due to the constant fighting, our parents had assigned designated timings for watching TV for us. So we were inevitably forced to watch whatever caught the other person’s fancy at any given time.
One of the more delightedly asides of hers when watching her movies and shows during her time, especially the ones where the protagonist was a well written female character, was when she would say, “That could only have come from a woman’s mind.” And it was not just a protagonist who is successful and brilliant in name but also a fully rounded female who can also be a failure and average. And it turns out while checking out the credits, she was mostly right. So while watching Saint Frances, I couldn’t help but remember my sisters’ words.
Saint Frances is a showcase for Kelly O’Sullivan, who both wrote and stars in the movie. As the movie starts, you find the main character Bridgette as a perennial underachiever and an overall average person. One can almost get wary about her character and think it is like countless other indie movies about underachievers. (I was immediately reminded of Obvious Child and Short Term 12 right off the top of my head.) Especially when she starts a job as the caretaker for a six-year-old Frances (an adorable Ramona Edith Williams).
When Bridgette’s unwanted pregnancy drives a further wedge in her life she has to choose between the pregnancy, and how it affects her life is what the movie is about.
Watch out for her reaction in the very first scene of the movie. As the man trying to flirt with her has unwittingly put her down, she realizes in horror that what he is describing, is her own life. Anybody who looks way younger than their actual age and had been to a date or an interview where they were very patronizingly told that they have so much to achieve as they are still young, only to be blown off when their actual age is revealed will know where that scene came from. That reaction when she tells her age to the guy who flirted with her, who promptly walks away, not wanting to waste his perfect made-to-impress story on an underachieving over-the-hill server sets up the rest of the hopefully star-making performance in the movie.
Equally good is the reactions of Jace played by Max Lipchitz to the same revelation of her age. His sweet acknowledgment of her age AND her blood all over the sheets and their faces after the first night they had sex shows just how accepting this guy can be. The matter of fact way in which it is dealt with along with many other bodily changes a woman goes through shows how intuitively Kelly has written the movie. Or like my sister says, “Yup, that came from a woman.”
It is interesting to see how Frances’ parents Maya and Annie have polar opposite reactions to the new nanny. Annie, the working mother being more business-like and wary of Bridgette, and Maya, who is going through postpartum depression after the birth of their second child. They initially come across as a typical same-sex movie couple (again, the indie version, not the dialed up hammy version). Especially Annie, who is the strict uptight working mom. But Lily Mojekwu’s outburst in front of Brigette about the pressures of having to do all the heavy lifting does a lot to help us to root for her. Charin Alvarez is also great as Maya, who is going through her changes as a result of her childbirth.
But you have to reserve your praise for Ramona Edith Williams as the titular Saint Frances. When she makes an innocent and sweet pact with Bridgette at the end of the movie, it is such a lovely moment that you root for them to make it happen.
Outwardly, the story sounds like it came straight from a studio comedy with the nanny slowly changing the lives of the family in hilarious ways. Thankfully, Kelly and first-time director Alex Thompson does more than enough to inject the tale with much needed honestly and freshness.
With the awards and holiday seasons coming to a collision course, there is a bounty of new releases hitting theaters and VOD platforms. Don’t get me wrong, I love having a vast amount of content to sift through, especially given the relative dearth of content 2020 has brought on the big screen. However, this weekend’s sizable output gives me little time to cover each release, which is why I am embracing this abridged format to catch you up to speed. Let’s get to it!
Synopsis: 1840s England, acclaimed but overlooked fossil hunter Mary Anning and a young woman sent to convalesce by the sea develop an intense relationship, altering both of their lives forever.
Given all the turmoil going on in the film industry/world at large, there’s something oddly comforting about the latest awards-hopeful Ammonite. Even in a truncated year, studios are still here to greet audiences with flat, Oscar-bait offerings that can’t hide their simplistic intentions.
Ammonite’s middling results are befuddling considering the immense talent behind it. Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan are compelling as always, unearthing subdued dimensions from the character’s internal struggles. Their longing and displeasure simmer through each frame, with the two combating the societal standards that keep them an arms distance from personal freedoms.
While the two actresses are great as individuals, Ammonite never allows the duo to grow onscreen. There’s no spark to draw from their insular performances, with director Francis Lee struggling to generate emotion from his mannered craftsmanship. Even for a subdued effort like this, the lacking chemistry consistently keeps viewers away from the character’s painful (and exceedingly relevant) struggles. Ammonite rarely makes a major misstep, but the project never resonates the way it intends to.
Synopsis: Kit, a British Vietnamese man, returns to Saigon for the first time in over 30 years, after fleeing during the Vietnam-American War.
Have you ever returned to an old stomping ground only to be met with a lingering sense of melancholy? While you can revisit the sites you once traversed, those once-beloved locations now leave a foreboding malaise. That raw sentiment renders throughout Monsoon, a meditative drama that never loses its humanistic drive.
Don’t get me wrong, this is set-up has been portrayed in a countless array of festival films. Some of these efforts have thrived (TheFarewelland Garden State), while others have joined a long list of forgotten festival failures (The Only Living Boy in New York). Director Hong Khaou thankfully makes this premise his own though, favoring a quiet atmosphere that subverts the mawkish sentimentality that typically derives from films of this elk.
Khaou’s visceral craftsmanship registers poetic potency, with patiently-constructed long-takes allowing viewers to breathe in the setting alongside Kit. It also provides star Henry Golding ample opportunities to display his acting chops. The Last Christmas star possesses a natural gravitas onscreen, peeling at Kit’s protective layers through his effectively insular delivery. This film rests solely on Khaou and Golding’s abilities, but the well-matched duo certainly proves they are up for the task. Monsoon unearths its quaint observations with an equal measure of emotion and craft.
Monsoon is now available on VOD Platforms
DREAMLAND – Directed by Miles Joris-Peyrafitte
Synopsis: Amid the dust storms and economic depression of Dustbowl Era Oklahoma, Eugene Evans finds his family farm on the brink of foreclosure. His last bet to save the farm is the bounty on the head of fugitive bank robber Allison Wells. Once he stumbles upon Allison, Eugene begins to fall for her as he searches for a more profound life.
Dreamland’s set-up reads like a Bonnie and Clyde rip-off, a fact which director Miles Joris-Peyrafitte seems well-aware of. Along with his exquisite visual eye (he takes the empty Dusk Bowl setting and infuses it with a visceral poeticism), Joris-Peyrafitte approaches this familiar narrative ground with a reflective sensibility.
Dreamland operates at its best when uncorking the purpose behind its pulpy plot dynamics. Screenwriter Nicolaas Zwart uses his set-up to observe the respective allures of a grandiose lifestyle, with Eugene willingly embracing a deadly mission after years of being brainwashed by adventure stories. This conceit cleverly comments on our own relationship with high-stakes storytelling, a wistfulness that Zwart and Joris-Peyrafitte aptly juxtapose in the film’s melancholic final third. Credit to stars Margot Robbie and Finn Cole breathing assured performances from the character’s makeshift relationship.
The promising thematic conceits can only take Dreamland so far though. Zwart’s script utilizes a novel-esque approach that lands with an awkward thud, lacking the dramatic grace to completely reinvent its well-trudged devices. That being said, I do think Zwart and Joris-Peyrafitte craft a thoughtful film that lingers with audiences past its runtime.
One aspect I love about streaming services is that they will recommend viewers films and shows that they may not be aware of and Disney+ is no exception. After writing about Pixar’s first short ‘Luxo.Jr’ last week, another short was recommended to me which was ‘Destino’.
‘Destino’ is a 6-minute Disney short film that was released in 2003. However, the short had been in production for 50 years and was a collaboration between Walt Disney and surreal artist Salvador Dali. The film tells the tragic tale of a mortal woman who falls in love with Chronos, the personification of time.
The short was originally storyboarded, and a minute of the film, was animated in 1945. However, due to financial trouble (due to World War 2), production ceased and interest in production decreased even further as the years went on.
The short could be mistaken for an early segment of ‘Fantasia’ and it’s not surprising that Roy Disney was also working on ‘Fantastia 2000’ at the same time as completing this in 1999. To furthermore help its authenticity, John Hench was brought in as the main artist…whom had worked on the original storyboards in the 1940’s. The abstract visuals are accompanied by the song ‘Destino’ which was performed by Dora Luz and recorded before the film started production in the 1940’s. While the studio, at the same time, loathed the quality of the recording, I think it works with the surreal visuals and helps give the film a dream-like portrayal.
The symbolism that is portrayed by each of Dali’s art pieces is something to admire as well. The various landscapes of the film’s setting constantly change to show the two characters that they could never be together; they are complete opposites in terms of how much time they’ll have with each other. It’s tragic but beautiful.
Streaming services can recommend viewers the most obscure or interesting films and shows but, in some cases, it can recommend a piece of history. This was a collaboration that I was not aware of but am glad I watched. While the transitions between shots is a little frustrating, it’s a small complaint given that this project nearly didn’t see completion at all, and this was the best way that it could be finished and connected together.
While I would recommend ‘Destino’, I would mainly recommend this to anyone with an interest in film and animation history, or if you are wanting to see something that’s different from modern animations. This is a short film that will not be for everyone, and that’s ok. Whether it’s liked or not, it’s still a piece of Disney history that was nearly forgotten about.
“Wrath” is a short movie, conceived, written and photographed in two months during the quarantine in Michigan, USA in March 2020. Co-directed by Meg Case and her partner Brad Porter, this movie takes us into the intimacy of Emily (played by Meg Case), a young woman who spends her quarantine alone in her apartment.
Throughout the film, we witness to the deterioration of Emily’s mental state as the days go by. We follow her in her daily life, in her habits, as close as possible to her intimacy.
We bathe in a warm apartment, full of green plants and very sunny. A place that may seem quite suitable for living in quarantine. But this daily life will gradually be upset by the appearance of hallucinations and anxiety attacks due to a growing paranoia.
A paranoia fed by loneliness, fear of the outside world and Covid-19. Through this fear of the virus, we find, more globally, the fear of death. This fear will be fed by the successive appearance of several dead animals but also by the presence of worms, often product of hallucinations, which can symbolise decomposition.
These feelings of loneliness, anguish and paranoia will be very rightly interpreted by Meg Case who will allow us to fully live the movie. Throughout the film, the different music and sound editing perfectly suits these feelings, especially the anguish. One reproach can be made, it’s a slight lack of rhythm, which can easily be explained by the near absence of dialogue. Fortunately, a dynamic editing allows to keep some rhythm.
The photographs and shots are very aesthetic. The shades of color, ranging from a simple natural light to the dewy light from the LED used for the plants allow us to immerse ourselves in this story of a disturbing realism but also quite magical. A few years ago, a situation like this one, including a global virus and a global quarantine, could have seemed imagined by an overly imaginative mind.
https://vimeo.com/476261101
Today, it’s this promiscuity with reality which is one of the greatest strengths of the movie. All over the world, a majority of the population has experienced this situation of quarantine. A situation that is often strongly linked with a feeling of loneliness, confinement and anxiety about a new situation that is not yet well understood and whose outcome is still uncertain.
It’s a very strange short movie that can create the desire to be more creative and active during this second wave of quarantine.
