Category: REVIEWS

No film throughout history has been as influential as King Kong. It sounds impossible, to hear that a film about a giant gorilla who fights dinosaurs, falls in love with a human woman and then gets shot down while on top of the world’s tallest building could ever be a classic. But that is exactly what King Kong is, and it has actually aged remarkably well. Yes, the dialogue and acting is fairly cheesy by today’s standards, and of course you know that Kong and the dinosaurs aren’t really and are essentially just moving models. But it’s the films execution and the power it has over our hearts and imagination that really bring this film to life; not to mention the fact that you can feel every sweat of effort that was put into it. There have, of course been many sequels, remakes, spin-offs and rip-offs, some of which were mediocre, some were awful and some were actually really good; but there really is only one true King Kong film. So, compared to such high standards, how does new incarnation Kong: Skull Island hold up?

The story of this one is that, in 1973 a military expedition to an uncharted island, that’s hidden by storms, plans to scientifically map out the island before Soviet rivals can do so (make the most of what they have while they can, basically). After dropping what are essentially bombs on the island they are attacked by its king, Kong. What follows is a conflict of interest, with some wanting to leave the island right off, some wanting to get proof first and some wanting to exact revenge on the titanic primate. Along the way they encounter many strange beasts and environments, and soon discover that Kong is fighting his own war against the real enemy on the island; the savage skullcrawlers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2onxgmKT1fw

I’m going to go into more detail on the film here, but before I do I’m going to get something out of the way. There are actually two basic ways I can sum up this film. If you are looking for some fun; just a big blockbuster, with Kong wrecking choppers and fighting monsters, with Tom Hiddleston playing the action hero, saving people from the same monsters, with Samuel L Jackson becoming more insane as it goes on and carrying an over-the-top theme of the war with nature (and war in general), then you should see this film as it is a blast and is just so entertaining. But if you want to see a King Kong film, with deeper meanings, that pushes boundaries, that features great characters to accommodate the monsters and action, or if you are looking for Jurassic Park meets Apocalypse Now, then you’re going to be disappointed.

King Kong in this film looks great. He’s much larger and far more powerful than we have ever seen him before. He’s nearly a 100-foot tall and from the get-go takes out a whole squadron of helicopters. And the film says that he’s basically just a teenager, he’s still growing is what I remember them saying. This is really just to get him ready to fight Godzilla in 2020; yes the 2014 Godzilla and this one, plus the upcoming Godzilla: King of the Monsters all share the same universe, just like Marvel and DC. That is crazy to me, in a good way as I grew up with films like King Kong and the Ray Harryhausen monster movies, so this is a dream to me. Also on the island are the Skullcrawlers, who are also pretty good; they’re very well designed and the effects look great too. The moments when Kong and them wrestle or when the human characters face against them are awesome. This helped by the fact that, just like Godzilla before it, the film has a great sense of scale. Kong feels huge, especially when we see his silhouette against the sun, and the skullcrawlers are given an equal amount of scale to them. There are a good number of other monsters on the island and every single one of them looks great. If I were a kid I would have loved this film for just this alone.

Also inhabiting the island is our cast of characters. Just from the credits you can tell the acting that we are going to get. Tom Hiddleston, Brie Larson, Toby Kebbell, John C. Riley, John Goodman and Samuel L. Jackson; that there is our cast people. The thing is though, while these are all great actors, here they are given nothing to really work with because of their characters. I’m not saying that their characters are bad, but they are extremely basic. Hiddleston is our hero, and that’s really all he is. He’s still Hiddleston; he plays him well and he is very charming and likable, but I don’t remember anything about him other than his actor. Brie Larson is the heroine of the film and she’s a photographer; and that’s it. Again, played really well by a great actress, but there was nothing else to her as a character. The same goes for pretty much all the side-characters too, including John Goodman, who’s basically just there to get the plot going. Riley and Jackson are really the only ones who have something memorable about them. With Riley, it’s that he has been on this island for many years, giving his character some decent backstory. He also acts as the comic relief, and I actually thought that he was pretty funny. While Jackson gets more of a Captain Ahab and Moby Dick thing going on, and only gets crazier towards the end. All parts are played fine, and it does speak a lot to these actors when their characters are so bland yet I can feel sorry when things go wrong for them (a self-sacrifice moment stands out for that), but nobody is giving the best of their career either. You can tell that most actors signed on for the fun of it, and it does look like they all had fun with it though.

Sadly, alongside the weak characters, Kong: Skull Island has a very strange structure to it as well. Tonally and visually it’s fairly consistent and it does work well as a metaphor for the horrors of war, with echoes of Vietnam. But pacing wise it’s a little, well strange. You barely have time to lay back and catch your breath because most quiet moments get interrupted by something fast and aggressive, and then those moments will suddenly calm down. I’m not sure if this was a conscious decision or not, but it felt pretty jarring. Sometimes this jarring was effective, and others it just wasn’t. It’s also bizarrely edited too. Some fight scenes were a little hard to keep track of, yet others ran smoothly. Scenes will start and end with no real warning. And the film moves by so fast that if our characters did have something interesting about them, then it was brushed aside to make way for more action. And then comes the big question: if we’re here for the action with Kong, do we need to care for the characters really? It’s a tough one to answer, but I can only give my take. Films like Kong: Skull Island, and others like Predators and Jurassic World can get away with it. Because when we reach those moments, they are great and more than worth the price of admission. I would prefer it if I did know the characters, but when they’re well-acted then you can sympathise with them to an extent. Because every scene with Kong and the Skullcrawlers is so awesome to watch, and they appear often enough, I can look past the films shortcomings and enjoy it for what it is.

When all is said and done Kong: Skull Island is not great, and if you expected great then you really can only blame yourself. But it is great fun. I really enjoyed it, but I knew what it was; it was a B-Movie that featured Kong. Once that was accepted then I was able to enjoy the film to its full extent. I had seen it with my family and we all enjoyed it, and when the time comes it will definitely have a place in my DVD collection, maybe even the Blu-Ray one. This might sound simple but if you want to gage whether or not you’ll enjoy it, just watch the final trailer; it will give you all you need to make the perfect judgement. It’s still not a scratch on the original, but it’s something I shall definitely see again.

It’s always impressive when a complex yet heart-filled story can be told within a runtime of 15-minutes. But that is exactly what Mark J. Blackman does with his urban-fantasy film Neon. The story of Neon focuses on the love of a man and woman who have never met, in fact they have only spoken on the phone. The problem they have faced, and continue to face is his job. It is a job that forbids love, despite helping others find it. All he can do to be with her is quit said job; an act that will be far less cut and dry as it sound. And it is a story that would not work as a feature length film. But as a short, well that’s where magic is at work.

The genre of urban fantasy is one that has developed a bad reputation over the years, and to be fair that reputation is deserved. But what makes such a setting in Neon work, other than the runtime, is how well it actually manages to incorporate the supernatural element of the plot into that of the real world setting. Helping out with this is the films sense of style. When the story focuses on the female lead the style is a bright, mostly white and very BBC drama feel, as opposed to when the focus is placed on the male character, where it’s dark and neon covered (true to the title), giving off a tech-noir feel not too dissimilar from that seen in films like Attack the Block, The Terminator and last year’s Nerve. This helps give the film a differential feel between these two settings, yet they also feel similar enough, and with interconnecting characters to help, that they feel like a part of the same world too. Maybe I have a soft spot, having grown up with films from such people as John Carpenter, James Cameron and Ridley Scott, but I found the style to not only be visually gripping, but add more to the story and atmosphere than any line of dialogue.

That is not to say that the dialogue is bad, not at all. This is a very well written film that utilises its runtime as best as it can. Blackman does not fall into the trap of wasting dialogue on his characters. Every word has the weight that it needs to carry the film forward. He also has a good grip on his actors as well. Our leads are played by Joe Absolom (from Eastenders) and Kerry Bennett (from Hollyoaks, neither shows particularly interest me), and they both play them very well. These are not conventional characters, especially Absolom’s, so it is very impressive that they both played their parts so naturally. There isn’t that overacting moment or the “let’s really sell this” moment from them, it’s just the emotion that we as people have on display from them. Through them I found the characters to be oddly compelling and I was constantly waiting to see what twist or turn they came to next.

But something else that impressed me was how professional the film was. It looks and sounds amazing, and I’m not just talking about the style. The cinematography is excellent and it gives the impression of being helmed by a perfectionist who knows exactly how to get the shots that he wants for his films. This is helped with the fact that the sets and visual effects are on par with those seen in the later season of Game of Thrones. Most impressive, as I can’t imagine the budget was a large one. The audio and music are spot on and aid the atmosphere in the ways which it needed. Everything about this film was competently made; which does make it a shame when we get to the ending. There is a slow-motion segment, showing us multiple side of this story in a slower frame and little audio, allowing the music and visuals to convey the message. It is a well-directed and put together scene, one that does drive home the point that the film was trying to get across, it was just too long. It goes on for over 2-minutes and, unlike the rest of the film, started to feel wasteful of the running time. It is a shame because everything else was spot on, and it’s not a bad scene, I just wish that a minute or so of it was trimmed.

Neon is a strong short film with an effective style and a strong cast and crew. While watching, I was constantly impressed by it. Sadly, I did also find it to be somewhat forgettable. It stands out beautifully while it is playing, but very little remains after a few hours. Still, you must give praise to a film that moves you during its runtime.

This raw, uncompromising film feels less like a documentary and more like a genuine, prolonged observance in to somebody else’s life, as if the screen in front of us was a portal that allowed us to live and breathe along with someone else’s journey. Such is Gleason, the engrossing documentary which has two noble aims: to raise awareness about ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and for a man to connect with his unborn son. About 15 minutes in, we are introduced and then soon disregard that Steve Gleason was once a daring and well known NFL player, because while it’s necessary set up, it’s not the reason this movie was made.

Instead we struggle and strain with him through his unfiltered, upfront and painfully intimate video diary told to his son, who will be born knowing Gleason as someone entirely different than what he will see in these videos.

Gleason is intense – Steve and his wife Michel leave nothing out of this exploration in to their life and love. Weeks after his ALS diagnosis, the couple found out Michel was pregnant.

This movie is filled with such intensely bittersweet moments.

Gleason participates in a triathlon with his friends, but his gait has become awkward and protracted. Footage of his football days rolls right in to a scene of his wife feeding both him and their new baby. The wealth of the Gleasons allows Steve access to the best treatments possible, and the couple fights the good fight to provide other, less well-off sufferers with proper care as well – they develop a charity that fights to have ALS speech devices covered on Medicaid, and they sponsor struggling families to take vacations they could never have afforded.

The movie tries to put forward a positive message of love-conquers-all, and that’s true, however the inevitability of Steve’s disease naturally places the same note of intense hardship over the entire film. Gleason is inspiring, and filled with love, but at times tough to watch and at other times intensely sad. However, since it’s a documentary about life, as it truly is, I’d say it gets it just right.

Gleason is in cinemas on March 17.