Out of the Rubble

(Penny Woolcock/2015/UK)

Using footage from the BFI archives, spanning from 1950’s Glasgow to London in 2015, Penny Woolcock looks at urban planning and social housing in Britain since World War II. By cutting across years and juxtaposing footage from different areas and eras she manages to build a very forceful and coherent message using a form of cinematic impressionism. It’s quite an extraordinary 18 minutes that shows how little has changed in attitudes to the poor, immigrants and social housing in over half a century. Through the montage style of editing Woolcock disparages the move away from traditional community structures to suburban, distanced and isolated living. Early on the Isle of Dogs in London is described as a village where everyone looks out for each other immediately followed by someone expressing the wish to tear down all the old towns and build them anew. T.S. Eliot, in Birmingham, pinpoints segregation of class and race as the failings of these new housing drives. Shock expressed at levels of deprivation in 1967 follows footage of deprivation in 2015, the initial hope and optimism in high rise urban renewal projects of the 1950’s contrasts with residents commenting on luxury, private accommodation and retail developments encroaching on their community as property becomes a premium and gentrification spreads. Out of the Rubble is a visually lyrical lament for an older way of life but more so a barbed critique of the one that has replaced it. It is a film I have watched numerous times since first seeing it and its impact hasn’t diminished any. Penny Woolcock, by carefully selecting old, anachronistic clippings from across the ages and stitching them together to create something new, presents a searing and saddening vista on a very relevant current issue.

(5/5)

Kill Your Friends

(Owen Harris/2015/UK) 

I don’t know what the book of the same name by John Niven is like; it was a best seller apparently, but this film is a mess. It just doesn’t know what it wants to be. It starts as an acidic take on the music business but a lot of the humour is neither as incisive nor witty as the rapid fire voiceover would have you believe. Nick Hoult’s character Steven is a deliberately repugnant and smarmy twat so when he kills his first pal it looks like it’s going to be a comedy of black humour following this A&R mans murderous ambition. It’s a good metaphor for the cut throat music industry and maybe this should have been the path followed but it starts taking itself too seriously. Things begin to come apart for Steven and he falls flat on his arse in a cocaine and alcohol binged descent into hell. The entire middle section goes off on this personal crisis, which is neither here nor there as he’s an unsympathetic character to begin with and Harris forgets to play it for laughs. Steven pulls himself together and starts back stabbing work mates and climbing to the top again. There is another murder but for a film called Kill Your Friends you can’t help feeling a bit short changed at two killings. By the time our hero has established himself as the king of A&R it’s hard to care about anything or anyone you’ve just seen onscreen. Everyone in the film is purposefully reprehensible with few redeeming qualities, I get it, the music business is scummy and we’re poking fun at it but the humour is second rate and the tonal shift from comedy to dark personal hell doesn’t work before trying to claw back the satirical punch line at the end. It’s really just a waste of time.

(1/5)

Wild

(Jean Marc Vallée/2014/USA)

An adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s memoirs about her mother, her mother’s death, the ensuing grief which leads to a fall from grace and Strayed’s redemption, embodied in an 1100 mile hike on the Pacific Coast Trail. Wild works well enough with fleeting, suggestive flashbacks leading to a gradual, impressionistic building of the back story being the best of it. Where it lags is in the present tense of the hiking scenes. A lot of the emotional pull is too obvious and contrived and there’s far too much mid to close up shots of Reece Whetherspoon and not enough of that spirit lifting landscape. Good performances from Laura Dern and Wetherspoon carry it and even though the final scenes are ruined by an awful CGI fox there’s enough of a heartfelt lift to have you come away smiling. It could have been much more than it is but it’s a decent watch nonetheless.

(2.5/5)

Boy

(Taika Waititi/2011/New Zealand) 

"We could not afford books, so we made our own"

The above line, from Patricia Grace’s novel Potiki, captures something of the essence of Maori culture; the importance of storytelling in defining themselves is crucial. And Taika Waititi brings this inclination to every aspect of Boy, a story set in 1984 about a family of Maori kids living with their grandmother after the death of their mum and desertion of their father. The boy of the title creates stories around his father’s absence to make sense of the hurtful situation. He invents his own mythology that defines his inherent sense of optimism and his belief in his father, a shield from the truth. His brother Rocky has superpowers, conferred on him at birth when their mother died in labour, again positively mythologizing a tragic event. When the father arrives back these stories also become a convenient way for him to sidestep the truth and he embellishes and expands the boy’s tales to great delight. 

But reality has a way of crashing into fantasies and the underlying sadness of this family’s situation eventually bubbles up and breaks through. The tone is perfect throughout, light hearted with the happy go lucky wonder of the kids humming off the screen in every scene. This is due to the performances of James Rolleston and Te Aho Aho Eketone-Whitu as the brothers and also the incidental animations bringing to life their drawings of their various stories. These animations brought to mind the TV show Moone Boy, also dealing with a young boy’s internal fantasy world, which appeared a year or so later and may, to a small degree, be indebted to this film. Waititi not only offers up a slice of authentic Maori experience but tells a coming of age tale that anyone can relate to. The Michael Jackson Haka at the end credits is a stroke of genius too.

 

(4/5)

Lone Survivor

(Peter Berg/2013/USA) 

Based on real events but widely accepted as exaggerating some details Lone Survivor focuses on action over character and as a result loses out on any real emotional punch. The photos of real marines which pepper the opening and closing credits make for an awkward grab at our heartstrings; that sense of pride in men going to fight a good war instead of coming across as genuine becomes ham fisted as the main characters are paper thin. Without any depth to the men involved in the mission, which is a failure almost from the start, the intensity of the fire fight becomes the crux of the film and reduces the movie to a mere action flick dressed up in stars and stripes chest beating. It’s a pity because it’s an extraordinary and sad story of a mission gone awry and could have been a far greater reflection on the US interests and actions in Afghanistan. But it does capture the ferociousness and panic of a close quarters gun battle in a quite visceral way, it does that one thing really well.

(2/5)

American Ultra

(Nima Nourizadeh/2015/USA) 

A by the book action comedy about a stoner who, unbeknownst to himself, is a dormant CIA agent and has to come to terms with his past when rival CIA factions clash over a decision to terminate him. Much hilarity ensues when he is triggered by a CIA operative looking out for him and he springs into action against his assailants. It’s The Bourne Identity meets Cheech and Chong and whilst there’s nothing new here it is a decent fish out of water hi jinx spy caper. There are solid performances from Kristen Stewart and Jesse Eisenberg and a few laugh out loud moments but it’s really just a rehash of various other flicks (see Kick Ass, Nikita, Bourne etc). Overall it doesn’t gel together in places but tips along at a fast enough pace to keep you watching til the end.

(2.5/5)

Phase IV

(Saul Bass/1974/UK & USA) 

Ants, imbued with a psychic hive mind from an interstellar phenomenon, begin to take over the world. Ok they take over a patch of desert in Arizona but you have to start somewhere right? A scientific team comprising James Lesko and Ernest Hubbs deploy themselves in the centre of the ant activity to observe and analyse what’s happening. The ants have attacked nearby residents and shown an evolved form of aggression. The scientists and ants go to war, as much psychological as physical and as small and seemingly innocuous as they are the ants seem to be the superior strategists. It’s one of those barmy sci-fi plots that presents a threat in something that from the get go you can’t fathom but then generates a genuine sense of unease and building panic as the humans run out of ideas and time in their battle against the teeny weeny army. The camera work on the ants is great and also the setting and exterior shots all add to the atmosphere of increasing paranoia. As silly as the story sounds it does keep you engaged and the ending is very nicely done. A solid low budget sci-fi.

(3/5)