I watched this movie right before I emigrated from my home country to the UK, literally the day before, so this tale of a girl going off to create her destiny may have entranced me more than normal. However, this movie is still objectively wonderful, and inspiring, and happy and another Disney success.
Total newcomer Auli’i Cravalho graces the screen as Moana, a wilful daughter of a chief (not a princess! Definitely not another Disney princess!) who aches to discover the world beyond her island’s reef. Her father forbids it, and she intuitively knows he fears something in her that may defy him.
Sure enough, her free-spirited, water dancing grandmother shows her an untold story of her tribe – they were once voyagers who sailed far and wide, unafraid and fulfilled with their true purpose.
After this discovery, brilliantly showed by shadow play on a cave wall, Moana’s mother gives her some food, she takes her pet rooster HeiHei (because every non-princess needs a dumb animal sidekick) and sets sail.
Chosen by the ocean.
It’s actually an amazing Disney movie. The songs are incredible – who knew the Rock could sing? Is there anything he can’t do? (Yes, he can never button his cuff links but nobody’s perfect) Maui (Dwayne Johnson) is a demigod Moana finds to ask his help in delivering the heart of Te Fiti back to her island, the loss of which is causing a disease to spread throughout Polynesia. They face dangers along the way including Jermaine Clement as a giant coconut crab – his song is a fantastic David Bowie tribute – with a low point of the movie being sentient coconut pirates who briefly assault Moana and her crew. Lame, but it is still a kid’s movie I guess.
Moana is awesome – she is independent, kind and willing to ask for help and give her own generously. She will make a strong and wise chief to her people, and is a fantastic instalment for the next generation of Disney loving boys and girls to be inspired by.
One of those original stories that make a new window to see life through.
Captain Fantastic is weird and awesome, and Viggo Mortensen is a perfect fit for the lead of Ben Cash, a man educating and training his six children to live off the land in the Washington wilderness.
When their mother Leslie passes away from suicide, the kids all openly cry together in anguish – toxic masculinity has no place in this hippie household – and demand to honour her at her funeral. There’s a problem – Leslie’s father hates Ben and threatens him with arrest if he shows up to the funeral.
The family have rebelled against capitalism, Christmas and consumerism – why stop at a pesky father in law? The family piles in to their bus and sets off on a road trip to say goodbye to their mother.
This movie is touching and bittersweet. The kids discover the wonders and beauties of real life (including a first kiss) but at the same time come to terms with life without their mother. They rebel against their father but are also terrified of losing him as well. The soulful soundtrack accompanies this semi-road movie, uplifting and hopeful as they literally and figuratively traverse new terrain.
This movie is a must-see for the great, original story and the acting – impressive on all fronts from Mortensen to the six children (George MacKay is basically a man but he has to grow in to it in this film!) Watch this movie for inspiration on carving your own path, showing your love bravely and fighting against the odds.
Everyone wants to know who they are and where they come from or so suggests the film Lion. It is based on real life events of Saroo who gets separated from his older brother and unintentionally becomes one of the hundreds of thousand lost children in India. Lion follows his odyssey to find himself and touches on universal themes of family, integration and loss.
In 1986 The little 5 year old who doesn’t listen, falls asleep on the train and gets taken across India from his little village into the teeming, anonymous metropolis Calcutta. 25 years later and he wants to find the family lost to him burning inside his soul. In the second half of the film themes of finding yourself, integeration, race are all covered but the pace is lost and it becomes too self aware. Whereas the first part of Lion is frenetic, heart stopping film and this is what packs the emotional punch. The viewer feels as lost as little Saroo. In the scene where the policeman in Calcutta asks him what his mother’s name is. He replies Mummy. In that one moment your heart is ripped from your chest as you watch hope evaporate in the hot, Calcuttan air.
Sunny Pawar plays Saroo as a child and his scenes with his older brother Guddu (Abhishek Bharate) carry the entire film. Dev Patel as the older Saroo with his girlfriend Rooney Mara are nice. Nicole Kidman plays adopted mother Sue Brierley alongside David Wenham who plays John Brierley give solid supporting performances.
Lion is directed by Garth Davis and he does a fine job. The script is solid and the ending is not as predictable as it would seem at times, there are definitely a few twists. The problem is the second half of the film. Are we a product of our environment and even if it’s a good one, is it enough? Do we always need to know where we come from? These are some of the questions asked and for the most part answered in the film. It’s fine to change the tempo but the scenes where the adult Saroo falls into despair are just too long. A little ruthless editing would have gone a long way. The first and second half of the film feel disjointed and the soundtrack is jarring – what started off as a really interesting and non linear biopic falls flat. It is thought provoking and you spare a thought for all those lost children who might never their families. Dev Patel plays the role solidly but he just doesn’t elicit the same emotional impact as the child actor who just lit up the screen.
It is nominated for 6 Oscars including best picture and supporting actors for Nicole Kidman and Dev Patel. However for me the young Sunny Pawar should have been nominated. Without his stellar performance in the first half of the film, this would have been a very nice but dull real life story.
A clashing orchestra of heartache, triumph and the absolute will to live and die on stage.
We are X is a fascinating documentary – encompassing classical music, rock n roll, the mixing of cultures and deep personal tragedy. So goes the story of Yoshiki X and his revolutionary band X Japan, and the trials of a man constantly struggling but also constantly overpowering his demons – told primarily though in depth interviews and archival footage.
We Are X is critically one of the most successful rock bands ever. And yet the West has barely heard of them. I certainly hadn’t. But 10 minutes in to this documentary I fell down this emotional landslide which showcases personal heartache within the band – including the harrowing story of Toshi, the vocalist, being brainwashed and then escaping a cult. The reunion of these two childhood friends is something that grips you so hard in it’s bittersweet embrace, you’ll be remembering it for a while.
In terms of story, the band is preparing for their reunion show playing at Madison Square Garden, and the doco opens the curtain to what has led them (or nearly derailed them) from this point. Hard-hitting interviews, emotional confrontations and powerfully inspiring messages make this very tasty for the soul. Yoshiki has never given up on his music – his own physical health won’t even stop him. The band has had trials and triumphs – their fanbase is incredibly ardent and uncommonly fanatic, even for a rock band – but it’s Yoshiki and his iron will to play and give his music to the world that makes this film so gruelling, so sad yet so satisfying.
‘Southern Fury’ will probably be a film you will see streaming on Netflix or the like very soon. Throughout viewing it I had a feeling that this will be just another film that gets swept under the rug from the get go. I have seen this kind of film before. They’re known as rainy-day thrillers, something you put on when it’s raining outside, you have a day off and just need something to do for an hour or so. But that doesn’t mean rainy-day thrillers can’t be good, the latest instalments in Jaume Collet-Serra’s filmography prove that. So the question remains that whether or not ‘Southern Fury’ will work as a rainy-day thriller.
The story is one that isn’t unfamiliar. JP (and yes that is his name) and Mikey are brothers who were once as close to each other as fish and chips, despite the worst of situations. All grown up the younger JP has become a successful construction manager while Mikey has fallen hard into drug- and arms dealing. The brothers, despite their efforts have never been further apart. That is until Mikey goes missing with a ‘mysterious’ caller telling JP to deliver an obscene amount of money in a set time. Everyone but JP think that Mikey is in on it so JP finds himself the only man who can save his brother. But all throughout, things…well things happen.
Southern Fury
It turns out that the question of ‘Southern Fury’ working as a rainy-day thriller is a very easy one to answer, because no it doesn’t. With films like this you know very well that you are not going to receive art of the highest calibre, although ‘Southern Fury’ does try so and to say it tries in vein is an understatement. Sticking with the story, it’s just too basic and formulaic. Beat for beat you can tell what’s going to happen. You know who the villain is from minute one, not helped by the fact that he is played by Nicolas Cage. It also has a horrible habit of throwing in new subplots and character moments that come from nowhere and return to where they come without achieving anything. An example is when Cage meets his brother; I thought this was going to lead to some strange conspiracy plot that could have taken me off guard, but instead it goes nowhere and is ended in the next scene. Being formulaic is a struggle enough without it being unfocused on top of it all.
As for the characters, what about them? You could rename everyone to Mr or Mrs Bland for the impression they leave. JP’s defining features are his constant monologues about how his brother is not a bad guy, just misunderstood, and the name that I’m certain is the abbreviation of ‘Jurassic Park’. Mikey has even less character to him. He is the big brother, the obvious victim and that is all. In truth he’s such a big man that I’m surprised that he was caught in the first place. All other characters I won’t really go into, because I’ve already forgotten them. There were only two more who stood out. There was a cop character who tries to help JP, who’s defining feature is that he is played by the once acclaimed and much sort-after John Cusack. A man who is clearly just hear to grab a pay-slip. And then the villain, who again is only really defined by the actor playing him. Nicolas Cage is also hear for the pay-slip but he at least looks to be having some fun in the role. He has his now infamous freak-out moments in the film, has a bizarre costume too; the shirt and all that are fine, the hair is a little weird, but it was the prosthetic nose that caught me off guard. Every time I saw his nose it was a huge distraction for me. I know it’s a strange thing to keep bringing up but to see Nicolas Cage with the nose of Gerard Depardieu is a major distraction to his scenes.
Southern Fury
Other than that the directing is basic. Not bad, at least until the end, but basic. There are tricks that director Steven C. Miller has seen done well in other films, like the tracking shot from ‘Good Fellas’, the torture scene from ‘Reservoir Dogs’ and the slow-motion blood-splatter action from ‘Dredd’, but he has no idea how to implement them. In ‘Good Fellas’ we found it visually interesting and striking, while also giving us an insight into the protagonists mind. ‘Reservoir Dogs’ made us care for the character while also making us fear Michael Madson. ‘Dredd’ used the idea of drugs and the cartoonish style of Verhoeven action films to set the tone for the world around the characters. This film does none of that. That makes the tracking shots and torture scenes boring and the slow-motion laughable. Although to be fair you could have had the skills of Ridley Scott and you still wouldn’t have been able to survive the script. No line of dialogue is memorable, the pacing and tone are completely off, one moment being overly serious and the next a cartoon, and as stated before is completely muddled and unfocused.
But the films biggest sin is how boring it is. It never keeps your focus for more than a few minutes before you get distracted by that mark on your wall. The only scenes that kept me interested were when it became laughably bad. Nicolas Cage can usually be counted on for a laugh in a supposedly serious moment, of course. The slow-motion violence was so poorly implemented that it was a joy to see what faces our actors were making at the time. And there was also one of the most unnecessary, pointless and completely unsexy sex scenes I’ve seen since watching the trailer to ’Fifty Shades Darker’, which just had me laughing at how it was done and handled, not to mention the fact that it was here at all.
The sad truth is that the only time I would say this film should be put on is when you need white-noise while doing the ironing. It’s sadly not good enough to work as a rainy-day thriller and it’s not bad enough to be entertaining. What we have is just a forgettable action thriller with average directing, okay acting and some laughable moments that are sadly far too few. It’s really hard to get angry or offended by film that will leave not a single impression on you. Now might be a good time to change the title from ‘Southern Fury’ to ‘Southern Placid’.
