2019

BEL CANTO

Cert 15 100mins Stars 2

Opera is the music of love in this hostage drama which is a flat, tuneless and poorly paced exercise of uncertain rhythm which staggers to a muted crescendo.

Julianne Moore is luminous in a formal evening gown as Roxane Coss, an agreeably spiky and unsympathetic US opera singer, but for such an accomplished actress Moore’s a terrible mime, and we should gifted soprano Renee Fleming is doing the actual singing.

While on a tour of Latin America her private recital at an embassy is interrupted by revolutionary guerillas who take the international dignitaries hostage.

The surprisingly relaxed regime of the khaki-clad desperadoes leads to some midnight bed hopping and at it’s most unintentionally farcical this could have been named Carry On Up the Junta.

The script assumes opera is a great unifier so you may feel excluded if your musical tastes lie elsewhere, and bullet fire is a welcome relief to the preceding dirge.

EIGHTH GRADE

Cert 15 94mins Stars 4

Youtube star turned filmmaker Bo Burnham, writes and directs this US coming-of-age comedy-drama, and it’s an impressively assured debut from the 28 year old performer.

In the UK, 8th grade is the final year of middle school and the equivalent of Year 9, a difficult time for awkward and shy 13 year olds, such as the lonely Kayla.

Played by Elsie Fisher with painful honesty, she’s a social media-addicted tangle of anxiety with imperfect skin and an ordinary physique. An absence of female confidantes and positive role models means she has to negotiate life as best she can.

Kayla’s single-parent father is as equally out of his depth at parenting as she is at growing up, but the script has huge sympathy for the pair and is happy to forgo plot in favour strong character work and a high level of emotional articulacy.

It’s a shame those who would most benefit from watching this are too young to see it in the cinema.

 

PAW PATROL: MIGHTY PUPS

Cert U 70mins Stars 2

Super powered puppies bounce into action with boundless enthusiasm in this eager-to-please animation aimed at pre-schoolers.

A spin-off from the Nickelodeon TV series with no discernible increase in quality, it’s a mercifully brief adventure full of harmless buffoonery, bad puns and robot dancing from an err, giant robot.

A moon rocket belonging to the blundering mayor Humdinger and his nefarious nephew causes cartoon canine chaos among the inhabitants of Adventure Bay when it collides with a meteor which crashes to Earth.

Seeing it bestows super powers of speed, strength, flight and so on, on our plucky puppy heroes, the baddies steal the meteorite to gain its powers for themselves and kidnap the Paw Patrol’s human leader for good measure.

So the pups to launch an audacious rescue from the villains’ flying lair and attempt to save the day.

There are sufficient uncomplicated, colourful, and cheap looking capers to occupy the little ones, while parents do their best to have a catnap.

BEATS

Cert 18 101mins Stars 3

Experience the thrill of an illegal warehouse rave in this sincere if slight Scottish coming-of-age drug-taking drama whose energy is driven by the irresistible tunes of 1990’s dance music.

To mark the forced end of their close friendship, a pair of teens abscond with a fistful of stolen cash to an all night party where various family conflicts are brought to a head.

Lorn Macdonald gives a wonderful uptempo comic performance as Spanner, though Cristian Ortega’s Johnno is a sullen, slouching and too much of a passive observer whose one decisive moment feels forced.

Filming mostly in black and white drains the period of vibrancy, however colour is used to communicate the intensity of experiencing ecstasy, and the sweaty drug-fuelled ambience of the 1990’s club culture is convincingly recreated. The soundtrack is exceptional.

Beats is a nostalgic companion to 1999’s superior Human Traffic which starred John Simm and Danny Dyer, while to compare this to Danny Boyle’s masterpiece, Trainspotting, would be an unfair for all concerned.

A DOG’S JOURNEY

Cert PG 108mins Stars 3

Friendship wears a furry face in this live action family fable full of love and loyalty which will have dog lovers wagging their tails.

A sequel to 2017’s A Dog’s Purpose it follows the many lives of the eager-to-please and  excitable pooch, Bailey, whose thoughts we hear thanks to the comic voice-over of Josh Gad.

Each time Bailey dies and reincarnates in a variety of breeds in different locations, he remembers his masters command to protect his granddaughter, CJ.

Bailey turns up to help her at moments of crises but they’re all bark and no bite and balanced with lots of bum-sniffing comedy to entertain your pups.

CJ is winningly played as an adult by former TV Skins star, Kathryn Prescott, with veterans Dennis Quaid and Marg Helgenberger going full pelt to pour on the treacle.

Despite being an avowed cat person, even I could feel this soppy shaggy dog story pulling on my heartstrings. Doggone it.

TOLKIEN

Cert 12A 112mins Stars 2

Reeking of radioactive levels of unthinking snobbery, this dreary account of the early life of the acclaimed author of The Hobbit fatally overestimates the appeal of being cooped up for two hours with self-regarding and over-privileged public school boys.

Nicholas Hoult is sincere as J.R.R. Tolkien, Lily Collins is a bright spark as his sweetheart and Derek Jacobi’s professor is fun, but there’s nothing to learn and it lacks the epic grandeur of Peter Jackson’s Lord of The Rings trilogy.

Despite being orphaned and enduring the horrors of the First World War frontline, the film paints Tolkien’s earliest darkest hour as briefly having to slum it among the working classes of Birmingham.

He’s rescued by Colm Meaney’s kindly priest and sent to a posh establishment where he enjoys the fellowship of a semi-secret club who quaff champagne, mock waitresses and are as sympathetic as UK MP Boris Johnson’s Bullingdon Club.

Tolkien’s family have disowned the film and I don’t blame them. 

LONG SHOT

Cert 15 124 mins Stars 4

Charlize Theron and Seth Rogan try to defy the romantic odds in this funny and slick modern spin on the screwball comedy, set in the whirlwind world of a political campaign.

The South African actress plays US Secretary of State, Charlotte Field whose globetrotting groundwork for a presidential bid is threatened when she falls for Rogan’s newly appointed speech writer, and she is forced to choose between her ambition and her feelings. 

Charlotte was once Fred’s babysitter, and while he reminds her of her lost youthful integrity, her sense of responsibility slowly rubs off on him.

One time Oscar winner, Theron, demonstrates a deft comic touch alongside her emotional range in a glamorous role, in contrast to her shaven headed warrior in 2015’s Mad Max; Fury Road.

Rogen has to run to keep up with her, and from 2007’s Knocked Up to 2018’s Blockers, he’s well practised at playing a petulant man-child who slowly realises his faults.

Moments of gross out comedy and drug taking are mixed with some political satire and a great running gag about TV stars failing to transition to glorious Hollywood careers, which is especially pointed as there’s a game cameo by former Friends star, Lisa Kudrow.

Alongside many nicely judged pop culture references and a 1990’s soundtrack, Kudrow’s presence adds nostalgic appeal for a middle-aged audience. 

More seriously it attacks the hypocritical prudishness of US media to sex lives of politicians, touches on the limitations of the dating game for women of a certain age and status, and flags up the higher expectations and double standards placed upon them in the public eye.

However director Jonathan Levine treats these issues as additional extras and keeps the pace brisk and the tone comic even as the wheels of romance fall off the passion wagon in time-honoured movie tradition.

This is a movie well worth voting for with your wallet.

YESTERDAY

Cert 12A 116mins Stars 3

This juke box musical romcom is an amiable and safe disappointment from the creative dream team of writer Richard Curtis, and director Danny Boyle.

Gently humorous but shy of laughs, we have every right to expect a much funnier script from the guy who gave us Four Weddings, and something more interesting from the director of Trainspotting.

Watching it is akin to the experience of listening to a coffee shop song cover compilation while leafing through the Boden summer clothes catalogue.

Following a road traffic accident and a global electrical blackout, a part-time busker wakes up to discover he’s the only person in the world with any knowledge of pop group, The Beatles.

Using their songs to become famous, Himesh Patel must choose between global superstardom and the true love of Lily James. The pair are sweet and charming, and in her least annoying big screen performance, US comic actress Kate McKinnon is nicely acerbic as a US music promoter.

As the Beatles had split up before I was born, it’s questionable how many of those under 30 years old are sufficiently well versed in their music to understand the many laboured references and jokes.

So alongside Beatles songs such as the title dirge, Hey Jude, and Back in the USSR, there’s also lots of singer Ed Sheehan, who is game for being the blunt end of some gentle mockery while getting paid to push his unique brand of forgettable pop which seems ever more insignificant in this company.

Ed’s presence along with James Corden who plays himself, and location work at the Latitude music festival illustrates how middle class and middle-of-the-road this all is.

Boyle contributes typically bold flashes of colour and clearly has had a ball crafting animated visuals to accompany the classic tunes, while riffing on The Beatles film caper, A Hard Day’s Night.

But it’s mostly a greatest hits package of Curtis’ well-worn tunes, so stop me if you’ve heard this one before.

The lead is a tongue tied Englishman who’s oblivious to the fact his gorgeous best friend fancies him, and in order to get him to notice her she has to humiliate herself a couple of times, including at least once in public.

Their mutual vaguely posh friends have ill-defined jobs, nobody speaks like a real person, there are public declarations of love, and a last minute dash to a train station.

Curtis has built a career by borrowing heavily from authors such as Shakespeare, Jane Austen, and Evelyn Waugh, and here has a written a script about a singer who steals from the biggest pop band of all time, and which suggests having The Beatles in facsimile is better than not having them at all. It’s an exercise in self–justification and Curtis should let it be.

THE SECRET LIFE OF PETS 2

Cert U 85mins Stars 3

A tiger comes to tea in this super-cute animated adventure sequel to 2016’s monster hit and serves up the lions share of holiday family fun for your very little ones.

Max and Duke are confirmed New York City dogs who have a fish out of water experience when taken by their owners on a countryside holiday.

Meanwhile back home Max’s poodle friend has to rescue a prized toy from a litter of feral felines, and their bunny neighbour dreams of being a carrot munching crime fighter.

They’re brought back together in a looney tunes-style caper which results in our heroes on board a circus train chased by a pack of wolves in order to save a tiger cub from it’s cruel owner.

It often feels more a loose collection of jokes and sketches than a fully fleshed-out feature, but the quality of the animation is top dog and Harrison Ford delivers a droll turn as the voice of a Welsh Sheepdog.

 

THUNDER ROAD

Cert 15 90mins Stars 4

There’s a darkness on the edge of town in this melancholy, funny, excruciating and wonderfully affecting comedy-drama which takes its name from a Bruce Springsteen song.

However there’s barely any music in the film which is made in a naturalistic almost documentary style far removed from the wildly romanticised epic tune of The Boss, in a successful attempt to more realistically portray small town US life.

However the song is interpreted through the medium of amateur dance, which is certainly something I never expected to see.

Based on his 2016 short film of the same name, it’s the remarkably accomplished directorial debut feature of writer and star, Jim Cummings, who delivers a bravura performance of dignity, shame and sarcasm as a socially awkward local cop.

With his life shaped by his relationships with his mother, daughter, sister and ex-wife, Cummings uses his characters mental breakdown to examine the psyche of repressed, gun wielding white males and bring the state of the US heartland into focus.