biopic

BATTLE OF THE SEXES

Cert 12A 121mins Stars 4

Emma stone comes out swinging in this ace of a tennis drama. Fresh from her best actress Oscar for La La Land, she serves up another great performance as game changing tennis pro, Billie Jean King.

It’s smart blend of biopic, love story, sports movie and gender politics, with the famous 1973 exhibition match King played against Bobby Riggs as the focal point.

An astute businessperson King keenly understands her earning power is dependent on maintaining a saleable image to straight, Christian, white America.

While conducting a high profile public fight for workplace equality, the married King experiences a private sexual awakening. She begins a tender and passionate relationship with her hairdresser, played by Geordie actress Andrea Riseborough,

Steve Carell uses the full scope of his ability to unearth the humanity in the former US and Wimbledon champ, Riggs.

The rabble rouser is selling the match as the ‘male chauvinist pig versus the hairy legged feminist.’

Aged 29 and 55 respectively, Stone and Carell are the correct age or their roles. The tennis is convincing staged and though the speed of the game seems tame by modern standards, but the politics are vicious.

Not only is there a huge prize of $100,000 to win, but King knows her defeat would be as regarded as conclusive evidence of the inferiority of women.

These are the stakes which make this a more gripping film than this year’s other tennis film, the more introspective, Borg v McEnroe.

Entertaining, warm and funny, the script by The Full Monty writer Simon Beaufoy emphasises the importance of a level playing field in society, with winning being dependent on talent, dedication and courage.

Its a celebration of dignity, inclusiveness and a compelling argument for not having to compromise your identity in order to earn a living.

Though it’s game set and match to Emma Stone, the real winners are us all.

ONLY THE BRAVE

Cert 12A 133mins Stars 3

There’s a long slow burn to the action in this real life firefighting drama.

It’s an honourably sincere and respectful tribute to the bravery and sacrifice of the elite firefighters, the Granite Mountain Hotshots. 19 of whom perished saving their town from a ferocious Arizona wildfire in 2013.

However I may burn in hell for sniggering at the first degree levels of unsuppressed testosterone and muscle flexing machismo not seen in cinemas since Tom Cruise took flight in Top Gun.

While waiting for the call to duty, handlebar moustache-sporting beefcakes enjoy manly joshing, sweaty workouts and semi-naked games of pitch and toss. 

Jailbird Miles Teller is the new recruit trying to go straight by joining James Brolin’s team. Jennifer Connelly and Andie MacDowell play the weeping wives comforted by Jeff Bridges’ former firefighter.

The veteran star has reached an age where he now looks exactly like his father Lloyd in 1980 comedy classic, Airplane! I guess he picked the wrong day to quit smoking.

LOVING VINCENT

Cert 12A 91mins Stars 4

Step into the mind of troubled maestro Vincent Van Gogh in this intriguing and masterful composition.

One of the founders of modern art, the Dutch post-impressionist painter had a history of mental illness and self harm.

On July 27 1890 shot himself and died two days later aged 37, in the Parisian suburb of Auvers-sur-Oise.

Animated in the style of his paintings, over a 100 artists painstakingly hand crafted each of the nearly 65,000 individual frames. The bold colour and brushstroke create a liquid kaleidoscopic effect which is dreamily trippy and hypnotic.

This dazzlingly feat of technical virtuosity explores Van Gogh’s life, art and the mysterious circumstances of his death, framing the story as a murder mystery.

We’re asked to consider whether his death was a cry for help, a crime of passion or an act of commercial aggression.

A cast which includes Aidan Turner and Eleanor Tomlinson from TV’s Poldark, ensures by the end you’ll be loving Vincent, too.

THE GLASS CASTLE

Cert 12A 127mins Stars 1

Brie Larson fails to build on her 2016 best actress Oscar success with this shoddily constructed drama.

Based on the memoir of journalist Jeannette Walls, Larson plays the New York gossip columnist forced to confront her past when her parents move to a nearby bohemian squat.

Woody Harrelson and Naomi Watts wholeheartedly commit themselves to the shabby material.

There is an astonishing unintentional disconnect between what we’re told to feel and what we see, as woefully misjudged as filming Wuthering Heights as a heartwarming tale of everyday farming folk.

Walls’ journey from poverty stricken childhood to successful adulthood was an itinerant experience full of neglect and alcoholism.

Yet the film drowns the story in romanticised mawkishness and presents her father as an unconventional romantic with huge dreams.

There’s a lack of emotional truth among the appalling abuse, fear and violence. And despite being based on a real story, I didn’t believe a second of it.

GOODBYE CHRISTOPHER ROBIN

Cert PG 107mins Stars 4

If you go down to 100 Acre wood today you’re in for a wonderful surprise.

This terrific family film explores how playwright A. A. Milne came to create his loveable honey loving bear, Winnie-the-Pooh.

Filmed in suitably honey coloured glow and melting with sweetness, this is a warm and sentimental homage to the author and his most famous creation.

Remaining hugely popular since being published in 1926, the stories were inspired by the writer’s son and his menagerie of stuffed animal toys.

Father and son have a humorous though sometimes fraught relationship which matures as the Second World War looms with a melancholy menace.

Having experienced the horrors of the Somme in the First World War, Milne retires to a farmhouse where struggling with writers block he begins spending time with his son, Christopher Robin.

He’s known to the family by the nickname Billy Moon, and young actor Will Tilston is a newly discovered treasure.

Domhnall Gleeson is his usual excellent self as the PTSD sufferer learning to be a father. You have to pinch yourself to remember he’s acting.

Plus he cuts a dash in his three piece suits and blonde Lawrence of Arabia hairstyle, and it must be a pleasant step up from his usual supporting roles.

Aussie actress Margot Robbie struggles to maintain a convincing accent as his society wife, Daphne. However she is otherwise excellent and game to be frequently unsympathetic.

100 Acre wood is an idyllic adventure playground and the film is a hymn to the stunning rural beauty of England. There are lovely touches of magical realism such as we saw in the recent adaptation of Paddington, which has a similar charm.

Grand claims about how the best selling books gave the whole nation a lift after the Great War must be taken with a measure of scepticism, as 1926 was also the year of the General Strike.

However we can forgive the scriptwriters for their indulgence when they serve up a treat as delightful as this.

 

 

BORG V MCENROE

Cert 15 107mins Stars 3

This biopic of two all time great tennis players is broad stroke stuff and serves up too few aces.

It centres on the 1980 Wimbledon final between Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe, played with admirable application by Sverrir Gudnason and Shia Labeouf.

Billed as as the ‘ice’ Borg versus Superbrat, it saw the reigning champ serving for a fifth consecutive title against his up and coming rival.

The Swede is wound so tight his psychological string may snap at any point while McEnroe is reduced to not much more than a greatest hits package of famous on-court rants. 

With the result never in doubt, the film explores the psychology of the sportsmen revealing surprising attitudes to playing the game.

As their extraordinary five set battle becomes an existential slog, their is no sense of joy in playing or even in winning.

So contrary to most sports films, this thought provoking victory seems a defeat for both men.

AMERICAN MADE

Cert 15 115mins Stars 3

One of the most notorious CIA operations is given some Hollywood gloss in this brisk paced and colourful real life caper.

What eventually blew up as the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980s began with a dimwit pilot called Barry Seal, who was employed by the CIA to smuggle guns and cocaine to and from Central and South America.

US Colonel Oliver North, drug baron Pablo Escobar and CIA chief’s son George W Bush are just some of the famous people Barry encounters on his increasingly dangerous escapades.

A satirical script requires Tom Cruise to play dumb, which isn’t easy for the intelligent actor. Plus his clean cut image means Barry is never seen indulging in any of cocaine he transported.

And once again the 55 year old is paired with a romantic interest more than 20 years his junior.

The young Cruise once aspired to win Oscars and still yet might, but he won’t be receiving any nominations for this lightweight if entertaining romp.

ALL EYEZ ON ME

Cert 15 139mins Stars 2

Rapper and actor Tupac Shakur was only 25 years old when he was murdered in a drive-by shooting on the Las Vegas strip, in 1996.

This meandering biopic sees Demetrius Shipp Jr. giving an energised performance as the singer and the musical sequences have considerable power. Knowing little about Tupac before the film, I was surprised when I recognised a couple of his tracks.

However you won’t learn anything here which isn’t on Tupac’s Wikipedia page and the script is basically a check list of his arrests, romances, and recordings.

And of course it features Tupac’s infamous friendship turned feud with New York rap star Biggie Smalls, AKA The Notorious B.I.G.

But it’s less compelling than last years Straight Outta Compton, which covers the same time period and many of same musicians and producers.

Having releases 9 albums when he was alive, Tupac has managed to release another 7 since. Which is some going. So someone somewhere is still cashing in on talent.

CHURCHILL

Cert PG 98min Stars 4

Brian Cox gives a rich full bodied performance as the UK’s greatest Prime Minister in this compelling wartime drama.

Suitably stately and sombre, it’s a sometimes stagey account of his days leading up to D-Day in June, 1944. Having steered the country through the war, Churchill is affronted when marginalised by the allied Generals Montgomery and Eisenhower.

Moving between gravitas, charm, weariness and anger, Cox essays a deeply personal portrait of Winston Churchill. This is a man haunted by his disastrous campaign at Gallipoli in the First World War and anxious to avoid unnecessary bloodshed on the Normandy beaches.

As the outcome of the Second World War isn’t in doubt, we’re presented with a superbly performed character study, with each principal actor given their chance to shine.

Julian Wadham, John Slattery and James Purefoy respectively play Montgomery, Eisenhower, King George VI and and each give a distinctive interpretation of the very different personalities.

Miranda Richardson is sadly rationed as Churchill’s no-nonsense wife, Clementine, possibly because she dominates whenever she enters a room.

There are echoes of Shakespeare’s King Lear in this moving account as Cox humanises the great man, capturing his mood swings, self doubt, irascible spirit and sharp wit. Cox savours his dialogue, swilling words around his mouth as Churchill does his ever present Scotch and cigars

With an insistence on the importance of General’s leading from the front and concern for civilian casualties, the brisk script is inherently critical of the vogue for drone warfare.

An absence of spectacle and battles allows the elegant photography to conjure a carefully composed mood of apprehension and fear.

The power and intelligence of the film swell up on us, erupting in a magnificent piece of Churchillian oratory which may well inspire people to stand in the aisles and salute. It would be fully deserved by the film, and the man.

THE FOUNDER

Cert 12 Stars 3

Though Michael Keaton failed to win the best actor Oscar for his soaring performance in 2016’s Birdman, he returned as an early contender for this year’s award.

However this biopic disappointed at the box office and Keaton will have to keep waiting for his long overdue statuette.

The former Batman serves up a snappy performance as Ray Kroc, the fast food visionary who engineered a takeover of McDonald’s and created a global brand.

His performance is the meat in a sandwich of greed which provides passing entertainment but isn’t as juicy or as satisfying as you’d hope.