At Darren's World of Entertainment - a movie, DVD and game review blog.
The latest movie and DVD reviews - plus game reviews as well. And cool stuff thrown in when I see it.
Cast: Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, Stanley Tucci
Director: Tom McCarthy
Already showered in award nominations and wins, Tom McCarthy's powerhouse Spotlight is both an ode to the journalism of the past and a commentary on the present.
Against a backdrop of change, when a new editor Marty Baron (a relatively muted but engaging Liev Schreiber) enters the world of the Boston Globe newspaper, a small journalistic unit called the Spotlight team is given the job of investigating allegations of abuse from Catholic priests. But the further the team looks, the bigger the problem appears to be...
Meshing both procedural and montages of journalists at work, Spotlight is not a new story in many ways and both its subject material and execution are nothing new either - but it's gripping and masterfully acted by all involved, proving once and for all that a combination of perfectly paced story-telling and a gentle crafting of story are the keys to build any foundation on.
It's hard to single out any member of the ensemble for praise in this because they all deliver in many different textured ways; from Schreiber's quietly driven editor brought in to bring change and whose impetus propels the Spotlight team along to Tucci's nigh on impressive lawyer, this is a cast that are on the top of their game.
It helps largely that McCarthy's working off such a strong script, one that never stoops to preach its sins of the fathers storyline but one which also never sermonizes and talks down to its audience as well. It's a good solid film of good solid performances where less is more and where montages take the strain of a lot of the transitions.
Dashed through with moments of wry humour, the film does little to build its reporters and their backgrounds, but proffers tantalising hints of their lives outside the investigation. For some, that may be a mis-step but this film is more about the investigation and the politics thereof than the histrionics of personal lives and melodrama.
Spotlight works as it keeps a singular focus on story and narrative; it never deviates from that and becomes a film that quietly and mightily impresses from beginning to end.
If True Detective series one was anything, it was a trail blazer that reignited the McConnaissance and Woody Harrelson with sharp writing, dense plotting and philosophical themes in the marshlands. True Detective season 2 is the antithesis; a dumbed down, straight and simple season which, in effect, betrays everything the first did. Centring on a interweaving cop investigation into the death of a sleazy city manager, it may have attracted the likes of Colin Farrell, Rachel McAdams, Taylor Kitsch and the prospect of Vince Vaughn in a straight role, but it does little to build on the proposition and promise of the first anthology series. While it is a solid police procedural, the elegiac prose which elevated season one is elusive this time around. It's inevitable comparisons will follow, but the fact True Detective season 2 pales when held up to the first really serves to its detriment. With a predictable plot and an element of drudgery, True Detective season 2 stands on its own two feet; and while a solid affair, it is unspectacular.
The Hateful Eight - interviewing Quentin Tarantino and Zoe Bell
The Hateful Eight had a NZ premiere in Auckland yesterday and today, Mr Tarantino was chatting to journalists.
I was fortunate enough to get some time with Quentin to talk the film, his plans for the future and also who he'd like to see a film from at the moment. (With apols for editing mishaps at the start if you are listening to the audio)
And I was also fortunate to get some time with Zoe Bell on the red carpet at Newmarket during the event itself
Cast: Samuel L Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Tim Roth, Zoe Bell, Demian Bichir, Michael Madsen
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Cinema's enfant terrible returns with his eighth outing, a sprawling epic yet intimate film about justice, simmering tensions and life after the Civil War.
It's the story of bounty hunter John Ruth (Kurt Russell) and his prisoner Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who are powering through the wintry Wyoming landscape in a stagecoach on their way to Daisy's appointment with the ultimate hangman.
But as the storm sets in deeper, Ruth finds two others on the road seeking shelter; one is former union soldier turned bounty hunter Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L Jackson in usual commanding form) and Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins) the soon-to-be new sheriff of Red Rock where both Ruth and Domergue are bound.
Holing up in a stopover cabin until the storm passes, the quartet find a bunch of new unexpected faces. Forced to seek shelter, Ruth begins to feel uneasy as the pot starts to boil over with mistrust...
Age has not diminished Tarantino's cinematic fire and The Hateful Eight is further proof that he intends to rattle the cage and polarise the audience for as long as he can.
This potboiler chamber piece, so beautifully shot with its evocative use of the Wyoming landscapes in the opening moments, rattles with as much Tarantino DNA as you'd expect - and indeed hope for.
With his trademark dialogue in full effect, this film feels like his most mature take on character and does much to build a world that's pretty much set in one place (in fact, great swathes of The Hateful Eight feel like a stage play painted on a bigger canvas).
But here's the kicker with The Hateful Eight - it appears that everybody lies and everybody is particularly nasty.
Whereas previous films have had edges that help you latch onto those you're watching in some way or other, The Hateful Eight has a delightful penchant for ripping your sympathies from asunder.
With the very briefest of back stories for some of the characters, Tarantino delights in presenting you with eight people who are only there to be hated and whose ultimate fates are all tangled up in the post-Civil War resentments that will linger for years to come.
Ultimately, as with most Tarantino flicks, the film becomes swathed in as much blood as there is raging bile below the surface of all of these men. They are antagonists more than anti-heroes in the truest sense, with each layer of nastiness revealing yet more below the surface of every single one of them. And as the story evolves over its six wryly dark chapters, it's clear Tarantino's desire is to subvert audience expectations and draw on various TV western genres to paint this tapestry with more than just blood, and instead infuse it with gallows humour.
As ever with Mr Tarantino, depending on your tolerance for violence and colourful language, The Hateful Eight will be as much a personal film for everyone watching it. It's quintessential Tarantino though as it pours all the ingredients into a pot, stirs them around and stands well back ready for the powderkeg to ignite.
Of the cast, Jackson provides his usual commanding presence as the Major and steals the scene with one story which may or may not be true, but is certainly likely to never be forgotten; Goggins and Dern gel in a generational way and give the Confederate conflict a face that's never likely to be forgotten, thanks to Goggins' hillbilly stylings. Tim Roth channels Terry Thomas with his turn as Red Rock's hangman. As the sole woman (for most of the film) Jennifer Jason Leigh impresses with a turn that is more about what's unsaid than actually said - and her final scenes give rise to the meshing of the western with traces of horror as she stands like a Carrie figure in your traditional cabin-in-the-snowy-woods.
Mixing mystery, Cluedo, post Civil War politics, elements of The Thing (thanks to evocatively shot and lit exteriors in the wintry surrounds), a terrific Ennio Morricone score, some stunning cinematography courtesy of long time Tarantino aide Robert Richardson, a deeply verbose script which borders on shaggy dog story and teeters dangerously close to needing an edit at times, historical elements of justice on the frontier and post the War, and an ensemble which work incredibly well together, The Hateful Eight is nothing short of a seething experience that makes you work for its rich rewards.
Meshing both procedural and montages of journalists at work, Spotlight is not a new story in many ways and both its subject material and execution are nothing new either - but it's gripping and masterfully acted by all involved, proving once and for all that a combination of perfectly paced story-telling and a gentle crafting of story are the keys to build any foundation on.
Dashed through with moments of wry humour, the film does little to build its reporters and their backgrounds, but proffers tantalising hints of their lives outside the investigation. For some, that may be a mis-step but this film is more about the investigation and the politics thereof than the histrionics of personal lives and melodrama.
