movie review

Happy Birthday: James Cosmo

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jamescosmo.jpgHappy Birthday actor James Cosmo

Born: May 24, 1948 in Clydebank, West Dunbartonshire, Scotland, UK

Married to: Annie Harris (24 May 2000 – present)

Read reviews of the best of the actor:

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Movie Review: DOWNRIVER (Australia 2015) ***

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Deadlines to Submit your Screenplay, Novel, Story, or Poem to the festival: http://www.wildsound.ca

downriverDOWNRIVER (Australia 2015) ***
Directed by Grant Scicluna

Starring: Reef Ireland, Kerry Fox, Robert Taylor

Review by Gilbert Seah

Writer/director Grant Scicluna’s moody suspense drama premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival followed by a screening at the Inside Out LGBT Film Festival for its gay content. It is a worthy first effort, though not without flaws rendering Scicluna a new filmmaker to be reckoned with.

The story’s protagonist is teenager James (Reef Ireland). When the film opens, he is just released from juvenile prison. He returns home to mother, Paige (Kerry Fox) hoping to find out the truth about the death of a child. James was sent to prison for it when the death occurred when they were kids. Mother had turned him in. James did not tell the cops about the other kid with him. That kid is now a very nasty grown up, Anthony (Thom Green). The story includes a few other interesting characters, that helps keep the story interesting up to the climax.

Newcomer Reef Ireland plays James, the teen prone to epileptic seizures convincingly. Kerry Fox (SHALLOW GRAVE, AN ANGEL AT MY TABLE) is fine as his mum, and there should more of her in the movies. But Thom Green steals the show as the young and nasty Anthony. Playing a bullying, creepy and plain nasty character, Green also reveals a vulnerable side later on.

The film’s setting is perfect for this kind of plot. The action takes place in the country where a trailer park exists close by. There is a river where the folks go fishing and there are caves and abandoned structures. It is curious why anyone would want to live there unless they have no money and no alternative option. But it is surprising that in such a male chauvinistic environment, almost every young male is gay or has had a gay sexual encounter.

The gay sex scenes are shot mostly in the dark, making the sex appear even more erotic. Cinematographer Laszlo Baranyai does an even better job with the shots in the open. His camera glides across the beautiful murky waters of the river. The country areas outside Melbourne, where the film is shot, never looked more stunning.

But one of the film’s flaws is its muddled narrative. As the film progresses, there are many confusing incidents. Scicluna is found of overlapping dialogue with scenes. One segment has repeated dialogue from the next scene starting before the previous scene goes off. One other scene has Wayne (Robert Taylor) asking James to go fishing and a whole lot of people show up in the boat. James says that he will be gone of 5 minutes and ends up gone forever in an underground structure. As if things cannot get any worse, a lot of the actors mumble their lines, which is hard enough to catch when uttered with an Australian accent.

Despite the film’s flaws, DOWNRIVER is an absorbing film about youth angst. It covers universal issues like redemption, family ties, relationships, friendships and gay sex. It does not skimp on the nastiness which occurs quite a lot in the film.

 

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Movie Review: THE MAN WHO KNEW INFINITY (UK 2015) ***

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the_man_who_knew_infinity.jpgTHE MAN WHO KNEW INFINITY (UK 2015) ***
Directed by Matthew Brown

Starring: Dev Patel, Jeremy Irons, Malcolm Sinclair, Stephen Fry

Review by Gilbert Seah

THE MAN WHO KNEW INFINITY is the bio pic of Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan (Dev Patel) based on the 1991 book of the same name by Robert Kanigel. Growing up poor in Madras, Nujan (as he is fondly called in the film) earns admittance to Cambridge University under the mentorship of professor G.J. Hardy (Jeremy Irons). Initially upset at Nujan for his pride and refusal to work out proofs for his mathematical theories, Hardy eventually relents and lets the horse run loose. Together, they achieve milestones in mathematics, cracking the almost impossible task of formulating formulae for partitions.

The first 30 minutes of the film is boring while the the film is set up. Nujan is just married, shown to love and excel in mathematics before fate forces him to leave Madras and serve his true calling. For a biopic of this kind, one expects him to face hardship and prejudice in his new country while finally proving himself to the nonbelievers while uniting with his family at the end. The film felt headed that way and one would almost walk out of the film if it had not changed course.

The typical story is altered by the First World War that creeps into the story. The second is the illness (T.B. or Tuberculosis) that Nujan falls prey to. The rest is pretty predictable stuff with the usual ‘stuffy’ English dialogue put in so that the film feels put up on a high pedestal since it is supposed to have a Cambridge university setting.

Patel was the second option to play the main role as the filmmakers wanted an actor internationally known to carry the film. Patel, who has proven himself apt in comedy as in SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE and the BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL films, demonstrates here that he is also capable of carrying a more dramatic role, one that needs to show suffering from illness as well as desperation and despair. Irons looks convincing as the pipe puffing professor who ends up sympathetic towards Nujan’s course. Stephen Fry is remarkable in being able to make a lasting impression from a performance than lasts only a few minutes. The role of Bertrand Russell, the British philosopher and mathematician undertaken by Jeremy Northam is underwritten and exists only to make a few criticisms on Hardy’s character.

World War 1 is dealt with in terms of both prejudice and its futility. The former issue is demonstrated very effectively in a scene in which Nujan is beaten up by white English soldiers for being a freeloader in a country where the rest have to go fight and die for their country. It is anger that has its point and one almost impossible to resolve. Hardy organizes antiwar rallies dealing with the other war issue.

Associate producers Manjul Bhargava and Ken Ono are distinguished mathematicians who also served as the film’s math consultants. The math is shown only briefly but the message on the intricacies of infinite series and partitions comes across clear enough.

THE MAN WHO KNEW INFINITY make its case more of one of cultural acceptance than (one) in the development of new mathematical theories. Brown brings the film to an end all too quickly, wrapping everything up with Nujan’s eventual failure to survive from Tuberculosis.

 

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Movie Review: Neighbours 2 (USA 2016) ***1/2

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bad_neighboursNEIGHBOURS 2: SORORITY RISING (USA 2016) ***1/2
Directed by Nicholas Stoller

Starring: Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne, Zac Efron, Chloë Grace Moretz, Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Clara Mamet, Selena Gomez

Review by Gilbert Seah

NEIGHBOURS the Seth Rogen comedy with Zac Efron as a frat neighbour was one of the best comedies of 2014. It featured the funniest sequence in a comedy that year – the Robert De Niro segment in which Efron, Dave Franco and gang all dress up as De Niro to taunt Rogen and wife for calling the cops the night before to lodge a complaint about their party.

NEIGHBOURS 2 has tough shoes to fill. But thanks to good writing from a script credited to 5 writers, the sequel makes it. Jokes like the air bags and the Dean Carol Gladstone character (Lisa Kudrow) from the first film are brought back into the sequel. If a few jokes do not work, one can be sure another couple will in a few minutes. With hardly any time for the audience to take a breather, NEIGHBOURS 2 comes across as intense as the dressed up clown that shows up at a tailgate party, a segment that is almost as funny as the De Niro sequence.

The success of this film lies a great deal on the comedic potential of both Efron and Chloe Grace Moretz. Efron plays the older frat member, now graduated and unable to find a decent job and living space while Moretz plays his younger female version looking to party all the time. Teddy Sanders (Efron) helps her at first in renting her sorority house that just happens to be next to the house that Mac (Rogen) and Kelly (Rose Byrne) is selling. But Teddy switches to Mac’s side to help him evict the sisters sorority. It is a fairly simple plot but with plenty of comedy potential, with the setups well staged. Efron has proven his mettle in comedy as in the first NEIGHBOURS and the recent DIRTY GRANDPA. Efron can even be funny in moments demanding the audience to show sympathy for his character. Teddy, for example, shows genuine puzzlement on why eggs get hard whereas pasta gets soft when dunked in boiling water, Moretz, however, has the straighter role. Her character serves to anchor the story. Her sorority sisters, Beth (Dope’s Kiersey Clemons), and Nora (Beanie Feldstein) and other sorority members are left with the task of providing the laughter.

NEIGHBOURS 2 also lifts comedy to a level of political correctness. The gay jokes are largely positive, with Teddy’s best friend, Pete (Franco) coming out and getting married to his new husband. On the female side, the sisterly bond fosters positive feminism while male chauvinism (such as in the depiction of girls as whores in colleges) is frowned upon. There is also a comedic discussion on the difference between a male teen vs. a female teen losing his or her virginity.

While NEIGHBOURS 2 is funny enough, its desperation to top the original is obvious. The film grabs at any opportunity for a joke, even to have didoes dressed as princesses to get a laugh. The result is the film looking a bit ‘all over the place’ compared to the more focused original despite the almost equal high to hit miss laughter ratio.

 

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(THEO ET HUGO DANS LE MEME BATEAU) (France 2016) ****Movie Review:

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paris_0559PARIS 05:59: THEO & HUGO
(THEO ET HUGO DANS LE MEME BATEAU) (France 2016) ****
Directed by Olivier Ducastel et Jacques Martineau

Starring: Geoffrey Couët, François Nambot, Mario Fanfani

Review by Gilbert Seah

Truly sexual films just do not just contain sex scenes anymore. Truly sexual films use sex scenes to push their audience past some new psychological frontier.
And gay films do just that, pushing their audiences past boundaries straight films never reached before. BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOUR (L’HISTORE D’ADELE) portrayed very long hot steamy lesbian sexy scenes never dared before in a commercial movie. French Directors Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau do the same for the gay male sex movie.

Directors Ducastel and Martineau have already wowed gay audiences with their earlier films THE ADVENTURES OF FELIX and COTE D’AZUR. Their new movie on first love begins with an X-rated 18 minutes sequence in a sex club which commonly also exists as a bath house (spa).

The sex scenes are tastefully done, as evident in the light shone on the two when the two first meet. Their bodies glide towards each other before they begin copulating. Almost all is laid bare except the ejaculation which is assumed to have occurred when Theo reaches for the tissues.

Theo and Hugo meet and have steamy sex for the first time amidst a sea of naked men. Despite the graphic setting, the love comes across as a sweet and ‘innocent’ one which is put to the test after they leave the ‘club’. Theo (Francois Nambot) confesses that he had f***ed Hugo (Geoffrey Couet) sans condom. The subject of a.i.d.s was addressed in Ducastel and Martineau’s first film THE ADVENTURES OF FELIX in which Felix , the lead character had to deal with the disease. The couple Theo and Hugo face the same demise, but times have changed in 30 years. The majority of hiv positive people now survive under medication. Theo enters the emergency ward of the Parisienne hospital to get medication to prevent himself from getting the virus. This is in contrast to the directors first film, where Felix struggles to deal with his upcoming death from the disease.

The couple also meet a Syrian kebab worker and an old lady in the metro. In a short few minutes, these two deliver an abridged but very effective view on life as they see it. Despite the film dwelling on two characters, their apparently unaffected lives in the world are put into perspective rather brilliantly. All matters in the short time the film is set.

The two young actors have to perform as well as act their roles. The two newcomers, Nambot and Couet exceed expectations. They are extremely cute with matched body types.

The rest of the film, as hinted by the film title ends almost at 6 am in the morning in Paris. It is an absorbing film which turns out to be a sweet romantic film about the innocence of first love. A daring film that demands to be seen if one can bear the extended sex scenes.

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Movie Review: KISS ROCKS VEGAS (USA 2016) ***

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kiss_rocks_vegas.jpgKISS ROCKS VEGAS (USA 2016) ***
Directed by Kevin DeHaven

Starring: KISS, Gene Simmons, Eric Singer

Review by Gilbert Seah

For those who love music, Cineplex Odeon has put together a series called “Music at the Movies” that runs in cinemas across Canada. This series features music documentaries, concert films and music movies where one can celebrate ones favourite artists with other fans. KISS ROCKS VEGAS a concert film s scheduled to run for one night only all over the world on 25 May 2016. The film is comprised of two parts. The first is a documentary section lasting around 20 minutes where the planned show is talked about. The second and main purpose is footage of KISS’s 9 day run of concerts at the Hard Rock Cafe in Las Vegas, Nevada on November 2014 that includes exclusive behind the scenes footage. One night only!

In November 2014, a helicopter landed at the infamous Hard Rock Hotel as KISS invaded Las Vegas for an historic nine-show run. As the Vegas residency involves KISS performing on stage in a smaller venue than they usually do in arenas, much planning and preparation had to be done. The film reveals KISS to be rational business people, talented, ambitious and always thinking ahead. Their costumes, make-up and guitar bashing on stage hides the true nature of the band. The film shows a different side of a rock band that is seldom seen. During an interview with lead guitarist Tommy Thayer, Thayer confesses that the greatest joy he has experienced is watching a 5-year old kid on the shoulder of his father enjoying their concert. To him, he says, that is what genuine tribute is.

As the camera takes the audience on stage into the theatre in Vegas, exclusive footage seen includes sky-high flames, gigantic screens, a platform across the audience and of course, candid reactions of the spectators (priceless) as the concert goes on.

The film engages both KISS fans and non-KISS fans alike. KISS performs a lot of their famous oldies such as ‘Parasite’ and ‘Do you love me”, which even non-KISS fans should be familiar with.

The film ends with the encore performance at the concert of one of KISS’s most famous songs “I wanna rock and roll all night.” They do a sing-a-long with the audience in Vegas. Be not surprised if the audience in the cinema break out into song as well.

KISS ROCKS VEGAS captures the unique experience of watching KISS live without having to be there with the noisy crowds.

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Happy Birthday: Frank Capra (1897–1991)

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frankcapra.jpgHappy Birthday Frank Capra

Born: Francesco Rosario Capra

May 18, 1897 in Bisacquino, Sicily, Italy

Died: September 3, 1991 (age 94) in La Quinta, California, USA

Read reviews of the best of the director:

The Strong Man
1926
dir. Capra
Starring
Harry Langdon
Priscilla Bonner

LONG PANTSLong Pants
1927
dir. Capra
Starring
Harry Langdon
Gladys Brockwell

PLATINUM BLONDEPlatinum Blonde
1931
dir. Frank Capra
starring
Loretta Young
Jean Harlow

It Happened One NightIt Happened One Night
1934
dir. Capra
starring
Clark Gable
Claudette Colbert

MOVIE POSTERIT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE
1946
dir. Frank Capra
Stars:
James Stewart
Donna Reed

Movie Review: NEON BULL (Brazil/Uruguay/Netherlands 2015)

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Deadlines to Submit your Screenplay, Novel, Story, or Poem to the festival: http://www.wildsound.ca

neonbull.jpgNEON BULL (Brazil/Uruguay/Netherlands 2015) ***
Directed by Gabriel Mascaro

Starring: Juliano Cazarré, Maeve Jinkings, Josinaldo Alves

Review by Gilbert Seah

NEON BULL tells the story, set in a Brazilian rodeo setting, of Iremar (Juliano Cazarre) and his immediate family, all living at the edge of poverty. The family consists of his girlfriend an exotic dancer (Maeve Jinkings) and her daughter Caca (Aline Santana). Iremar works at a rodeo called the ‘Vaquejadas’ in the north east of Brazil. In the rodeo, two men on horseback bring down a bull by its tail (which is sanded for grip) within a time limit. There is no story but the film’s purpose is to show what life is like for them. The film works around Iremar’s immediate family and work while focusing on his desire to get out of the bull business as it is difficult hard-breaking work. Iremar’s passion, believe it or not is designing skimpy women’s clothes.

Mascaro uses dramatic set-ups to tell his story. The segment in which the little girl Caca asks Iremar, the mother’s befriend out of the blue for a hug shows the closeness between the two that is missing between her and her real mother. On the other hand, the mother slapping Caca in another scene demonstrates the mother just tolerating her most of the time. These often isolated segments do not help smooth the flow of the story telling, which feels choppy at times. The dramatic contents of the film, however, are strong.

Mascaro loves to focus his camera on images of bodies be it humans, even on co-worker Ze’s (Carlos Pessoa) pot-belly and his protruding belly button or on the almost perfect contours of the white bulls in the rodeo. It seems natural then, that his protagonist has the ambition to design fashion outfit as an alternative source of income.

The film’s cinematography by Diego Garcia is detailed enough to observe dust in the wind. His fond of use of shadows is apparent in the many night scenes. There is much to enjoy in the lighting department as well, as evident in a scene which is lit up by the needle of a sewing machine emphasizing Iremar’s dedication to his design work.

NEON BULL has the mixed feel of art and biopic. The slowness of pace and the often lingering of the camera with the explicit use of colours (the white bulls, the neon lights, the colours of posters) are the realistic dirty look of poverty of the subjects.

The climax of the film is where everything comes together – filmmaking-wise. It is a sex scene, very graphically explicit, shot in the night with shadows and minimal lighting with selected musical scoring. The sex is very erotic and different, between Iremar and his cosmetics saleslady who happens to be pregnant. It is not a scene for everybody, riding from behind, but tastefully done, arguably.

If the visual and dramatic setups are tied in with a stronger film narrative, NEON BULL would emerge a more focused film and even one that could contain a message of survival and maybe the mistreatment of animals. Shot in Portuguese.

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Movie Review: THE WAITING ROOM (Canada 2015) **

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Deadlines to Submit your Screenplay, Novel, Story, or Poem to the festival: http://www.wildsound.ca

the_waiting_room.jpgTHE WAITING ROOM (Canada 2015) **
Directed by Igro Drljaca

Starring: Cintija Asperger, Jordan Barker, Tatjana Cornij

Review by Gilbert Seah

THE WAITING ROOM shot in Toronto in English, Bosnian and Croatian has garnered praise in its limited run in film festivals which could mean one thing – this is the kind of quirky Canadian feature that is not bad but no one wants to see.

The central character is a middle-age struggling actor, Jasmin (Jasmin Geljo) who has immigrated to Toronto from Bosnia. He lives with his second wife and young son but longs to move back to Bosnia where his father, who he talks to frequently on the computer is. He has various acting parts, one of which is in drag (the reason is up to the audience to figure) and another one sitting in a car driving around with the background of Bosnia. Jasmin finds the pieces of his former and present life meshing uncomfortably. When he is cast for a role set amidst the very Bosnian-Herzegovinian civil war he escaped decades earlier, the line between fiction and reality become blurred. Director Drljaca blurs the lines of fiction and re-creation, the tragic and the absurd in the film.

The cast of Canadian unknowns perform relatively well, lead actor Geljo included. Production values are also sound.

Director Drljaca’s (KRIVINA) over serious film looks sincere but the film’s narrative goes nowhere and the film jumps all over the place. The only humour, understated obviously, comes right at the end of the film, which fortunately is quite the delight! The question is whether one would like to sit through the entire film for the ending.

The film premiered at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival is now getting a commercial release.

 

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Movie Review: KILL ZONE 2 (China/ Hong Kong 2015) ***

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Deadlines to Submit your Screenplay, Novel, Story, or Poem to the festival: http://www.wildsound.ca

killzone2.jpgKILL ZONE 2 (China/ Hong Kong 2015) ***
Directed by Pou-Soi Cheang

Starring: Tony Jaa, Jing Wu, Simon Yam

Review by Gilbert Seah

KILL ZONE 2, the sequel is largely different from the first film, this one being more ambitious and set in Thailand in addition to Hong Kong with both Thai and Chinese spoken. It also stars Thai action star Tony Jaa who is not in the first. Jaa is the star of the popular Thai ONG BAK action flicks who also landed a role in FURIOUS 7. Simon Yam and Wu Jing appear in both KILL ZONE films but play different characters.

There are several stories in this movie, all linked by coincidences. All are equally important judging from director Cheang’s treatment of each, giving each equal screen time. One involves a Thai prison guard Chai (Tony Jaa). His daughter has leukaemia and requires a marrow donor that only a person called Kit (Wu Jing) can give, due to matching blood type requirements. Coincidence has it that Kit is one of the prisoners in the Thai prison. There is more. Kit is an undercover cop working for his uncle, Wah (Simon Yam veteran of over a dozen Hong Kong films including IP MAN). The undercover operation turned bad and Kit is in jail. The suspect is crime boss Mr Hung (Louis Koo) who needs a blood transplant from his brother (Jun Kung), who turns out to be the cops’ suspect. A minor subplot involves the stern warden Ko (Zhang Jin) who wants Kit dead for the smooth operation of his prison. Mr Hung had saved the warden’s life before.

If you think the plot sounds difficult to follow, it is. It takes 45 minutes for the film to get its footing. At this mark, the audience is able to follow who is whom, who the bad and good guys are and which uncle or brother or daughter needs a blood or organ transplant and whether the syndicate deals with drugs or body parts.

The stories all come together at the film’s climax which of course ends in lots of martial-arts fights. A few elaborate action sequences include the ones at an airport and a prison break. These action sequences make the film.

KILL ZONE 2 share the same traits as most Hong Kong crime kung-fu action films like the IP Man films. Director Cheang accomplishes a rare feat of invoking some genuine emotions with the characters. The scene in which Inspector Wah and Mr. Hung talk it over outside a hospital displays seriousness in the acting department between the two Hong Kong stars.
The film is not without the typical corny dialogue. The worst of these is Chai comforting his daughter talking about how a seed germinates in the dark and the importance of having hope. The many coincidences are attributed to as Uncle Wah says God toying with them.

It is odd to see this commercial martial-arts film selected for a run at TIFF Bell Lightbox where art house films are mostly screened. Judging the other typical Hong Kong action flicks (from Golden Harvest and Shaw Brothers) of this variety, KILL ZONE 2 hits the mark.

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