Whoever holds the rights to John Denver’s work must be rolling in it this year. I’ve heard his song Take Me Home, Country Roads three times this year. Although, seeing as the other two uses of it were in sci-fi films of all things, at least Logan Lucky makes sense. What with it being set in West Virginia and all. Anyway, less on that, let’s talk about Logan Lucky.

Channing Tatum is down on his luck. His brother, one armed Adam Driver isn’t fairing much better and his sister, Riley Keough, is doing just as well. This, if we are to believe Driver’s ramblings, is because of the Logan family curse. They are a family plagued with bad luck and financial debt. Together, they plan to rectify that. A big sports event is coming up at a local racing track, with a lot of money being dumped into an almost entirely unmanned safe. Together, and with help from a former bank-robber, played by Daniel Craig, they aim to steal a lot of cash from right under a stadiums nose.

If this is sounding a little bit like Oceans 11, as well as most heist films out there, it’s probably because Oceans and Logan Lucky share the same director. Steven Soderbergh has always been an interesting customer on the directing front. Like Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve, Soderbergh has a talent for making art-house films disguised as blockbusters – whether it be famous films like Oceans 11 or Contagion, or the more obscure ones like The Girlfriend Experiment (also known as that film that starred porn-star Sasha Grey). I’ve always liked Soderbergh’s work, finding his films easy to get into and having a great sense of drama and humour – not to mention just being altogether well made. That being said though I only like his works, I don’t love them. And that’s pretty much the same with Logan Lucky.

Once again, Soberbergh has made a very well-crafted and intelligent heist film. There were twists and turns that I did not see coming, but never did they feel like cop-outs. Everything is played with a surreal sense of realism, despite how preposterous it can feel at times. What I mean is, the plan is far-fetched, but it’s handled or just explained in such a way that you believe that this would work in real life. The directing is pretentious, but not noticeably so – which is expected given his previous work. The writing was mostly solid too. Although, there were a number of scenes that either lead nowhere or came out of nowhere. Most character introductions are done without ceremony, mostly with them just appearing in a random scene. I can see people seeing this as a unique way of introducing characters, but I found it a little jarring. Maybe it’s just not what I’m used to, but I can’t help but feel distracted by it.

In term of acting, there wasn’t a bad performance to be found. Tatum, Driver and Keough worked brilliantly as a trio, each easily bouncing off of the others. We also have some small roles from Hillary Swank and Seth MacFarlane, of all people here, once again good jobs for minor roles. It was, however, Daniel Craig who stole the show for me. His accent was pretty distracting, I won’t lie, but he easily played the most memorable character in the whole film. He got the best lines, the best jokes and contributed a lot to the plot. He was also very complex in his role and at a point you do find yourself wondering if he is really on their side.

Other than random scenes and character introductions, I do feel that Logan Lucky could have been around ten minutes shorter. Not that it dragged really, but there was a bit of trimming that could have been done to tighten the story. I also found it hard to get invested in the heist itself. This mostly comes down to some weak reasonings as to why they are robbing the vault in the first place. There’s a throwaway line about Tatum needing cash to pay for a custody lawyer, but that is literally one line in one scene. Also, while they aren’t well off, I’m not too certain why they – Driver in particular – would go to the lengths they do to rob a place. With Craig it makes sense, he is a bank robber. But for the Logan family, not so much.

There really is much more that can be said without major spoilers now. Logan Lucky is definitely not the best film to feature Logan in the title this year, but it’s still good. Like many of Soderbergh’s films, I recommend it, even if it’ll be a while before I see it again. Good direction, acting and a fairly good script hold this film higher than most this year – and if you’re sick of heroes and blockbusters where things go boom every five minutes, then here is the film you were probably waiting for. Give it a go, you might feel lucky come the end too.

By Orla Smith.

Hello Again is insane.

It’s quite something to go into a film like this blind. I knew very little: only that it is a musical following various loosely connected pairs of lovers in New York City ― like an all-singing, all-dancing Love, Actually.

What I expected was something light, airy and decidedly PG… so you can imagine that I was surprised when the first vignette ― set in 1901 ― begins the film with a prostitute having (rather anatomically incorrect) song-sex with a returning soldier.

It doesn’t stop there.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gm5FF-S64I

Hello Again is, I believe, cinema’s first sexually transmitted musical.

In that first encounter, the prostitute sings to her customer, while his speech remains strictly non-musical. Yet that same actor returns in the second 1944-set vignette, and this time his every word is sung. The film goes on like this, as if music is being passed down the through the decades, it’s transition prompted not by love but by sex.

Hello Again has everything you could want in a movie: dominatrix nurses, bathtub masturbation, Audra McDonald as an autotuned popstar named ‘She’, the Titanic… and all of this with singing. All of it. It’s an object of awe, to be gazed at like one might gaze into a kaleidoscope. Imagine seeing The Room for the first time ― except it’s a musical with a bigger budget and (slightly) better actors ―and you’ll be close to picturing what it’s like to watch Hello Again… but nothing could prepare you for the real thing.

So watch Hello Again. Watch it with your friends, and exchange alarmed and bewildered glances as if to say: ‘Are you seeing this?’ ‘Is this real?’ ‘How did this happen?’

Hello Again may well be the worst movie I’ve seen all year. Then again, I’m not sure it’s fair to classify it as a ‘movie’. It is a collection of sounds and images, sure ― but none of them compute. It is a carnival of horrifying delights, here to be gawked at. Believe me: you will gawk.

Hello Again will make its world premiere at the 25th Raindance Film Festival on September 24th, followed by a repeat screening on September 30th

By Marti Dols Roca.

Shadows of a Stranger (2014) it’s a low budget debut feature film co directed by Richard Dutton and Chris Clark. This supernatural thriller makes us travel to the city of Meridian where detective Sherborne (Ian Mude) is going through a rough patch: cheated by his wife, scorned by his daughter, with a huge debt on his shoulders and haunted by the return of the village Christmas serial killer to top it off. When eccentric and filthy rich William Fallon (Colin Baker aka Dr Who n. 6) offers a million pounds reward to find his disappeared son, Sherborne sees his golden opportunity. He will team up with Xander (Chris Clark), a solitary young man with psychic abilities, to find Fallon’s son; a journey between dimensions that seemed to converge but are actually parallel and cases that looked parallel but eventually will become the same is about to begin…

Now, as it couldn’t be any other way, first thing to address is the visuals: in order to shot the movie, the filmmakers created their own blue screen and placed it in a barn somewhere in Lincolnshire. Therefore, all the scenarios where the scenes take place are digitally created. Let’s remind the reader this is a low budget debut feature film and such eventualities are understandable. It is what it is. It could also be said that at least is consistent as the whole movie is shot like that; there are no shot-on-location scenes whatsoever.  Thing is it doesn’t look good. It could if it was an aesthetic choice (Scanner Darkly, Sin City…) but it doesn’t seem the case. Yes, this is a low budget film but it is fair to judge it from the audience point of view and personally (and disagreeing with other reviews I’ve read) it kept bothering me as I watched it. On the other hand it does bring some nostalgia from videogames times gone by and every now and then that is actually somehow satisfactory.

Another issue is the soundtrack. Again, fair enough, well tried, it’s almost like… but it’s not. In this case it is directly the filmmakers’ choice and I think it’s a wrong one. It is a bit intrusive, melodramatic, it doesn’t help the narration and it can get quite clichéd: to the point that the old and loaded man who never leaves his house haunted by his son’s disappearance listens to Pachelbel’s canon… That’s what I mean when I say this one was the filmmakers’ choice: it has nothing to do with budget; and there’s nothing plainer than Pachelbel’s canon.

In regard to acting, it is all right. The cast is quite impressive considering the low budget nature of the film and it is fair to say there are good performances; there are bad performances too… And again, the digital environment doesn’t help when you see an actor clearly trying to use his body to make up for the lack of surroundings. It surely works in the theatre, meters away from the stage; but not with medium shot car sequences…

Finally, story: the most important part. The part that can make all the previous points look like minor details… I mean… It’s alright. It’s not bad. It is a thriller with supernatural elements that follows the classical structure of the genre, it has a twist and there’s a certain amount of mystery and suspense. In my opinion it lacks a bit of action or the characters being under actual threat more often but I understand that also means money and it’s already been established that’s what the movie lacks the most. I’m not particularly thrilled by the story or the script to be honest- and it has nothing to do with lack of budget. In BRWC we have reviewed many independent low budget films and if there’s something they have is the ability to use their weaknesses as strengths or at least rely more on subtlety or just a very strong story (even a different approach to filmmaking which by itself it’s a reason to watch a movie; it being better or worse…). To be fair, probably this is the lowest budget one of them all and therefore the challenge is even bigger. Having said that, a great story normally makes up for everything else and, unfortunately, it is not the case.

However, after judging this film as I would judge any other, as a show of respect and honesty, the movie shows ambition, a great understanding of some filmmaking techniques (framing for instance), and a good first step for its authors. Patronizingly enough (me being probably younger and less experienced than them but happening to write for a cinema blog) I think the movie shows that huge things can be achieved by persevering and never giving in and that’s not a small thing. The directors, cast and crew have managed to successfully produce a feature film that has all the ingredients its genre demands. It looks more like a good exercise before the actual thing, but it is not easy and it has to be appreciated as such. Having said that, nice try and best of luck for the next one.

By Kit Ramsey.

Our Last Tango (2015) understands that outside of the specific interest of tango and dance in general, audiences may have trouble engaging with a documentary specifically about two world class dancers. That’s why the film manages the extraordinary task of creating a hook to keep viewers engaged, by wrapping the subject of the tango in a magical docudrama that goes beyond what’s expected of it, weaving together universal themes of love, grief, ambition and arrogance in a way that keeps the narrative flowing.

Focusing on the lives, careers and love of Argentinian dancers Maria Nieves Rego and Juan Carlos Copes, the film has the sprawling sense of a historical melodrama, flitting between archive footage of the two dancers, reenactments of memory and fantasies, documentary style one-on-one interviews with the two subjects in the present and then real life sequences that come off as a mixture of all three. The main driving force of the story is mostly told from the perspective of Rego, though Copes does get his fair share of the spotlight as well.

We see her interact with various Buenos Aires-based young stars as she takes them through what can only be described as a series of half dance lessons, half oral memoirs. This choice of framing device is a stroke of genius as it adds a sense of wonder to what could have been a flat presentation if it were solely interview based. Indeed, the way in which Rego’s storytelling is performed with a sense of mythic romance is complimented by the art of the dance. The way it seems to organically come through, as if it were all part of the act, is what elevates the subject matter to a work of real artistry.

Overall while the initial premise of the film may not initially appeal to a wider audience than dance fans, the film is deceptive in that it transcends any potential pigeonholes of genre, and instead take the viewer on a  magical journey of two young talent stars as they navigate fame, tremendous talent and a turbulent love life. The combination of great story and glistening images of great cinema, from the glossy reenactments to the low-fi archival footage, makes this a great mixture of heart and spectacle.

3/5