by Oscar O’Sullivan

Monday – The Eagle and The Adventures of Prince Achmed

Now The Man doesn’t want you to know this, but there are actually hundreds of movies just sitting on Youtube that you can watch for free whenever you want – welcome to the world of silent cinema. I won’t pretend watching silent films is easy, especially at feature length – it takes a a serious adjustment to the way you absorb and engage with a story. I know that I still struggle to get used to title cards. I can live without dialogue happily, but having the image entirely interrupted with a wall of text to explain what was just said will never sit right with me. One thing I very much admired about The Eagle, a 1925 swashbuckling adventure film, was how conservative it was with these interruptions. The film trusted the expressions and body language of the actors to convey the majority of the mood and meaning, with title cards mostly reserved for introducing new characters and explaining scene transitions. The lack of interruption allowed the film to flow in a refreshingly natural way, putting more pressure on the actors to sell the story, a task to which they rise wonderfully. The story is a classic – a noble young soldier refuses to sleep with his queen for a promotion and goes on the lam, adopting a Robin Hood-esque persona to free his homeland from a tyrannical lord while falling for the villains lovely daughter. The film opens with an impressive horse-riding stunt, and though it doesn’t quite become an action epic, there are plenty of comical thrills and spills, memorable characters and a sappy, feel-good ending. While it may not be as visually adventurous or stunning as the silent-era masterpieces, it is a well-formed premonition of what the action genre would grow into. 8/10.

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (or Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed in the original German) is the first surviving example of an animated feature film, beating Walt Disney to the punch by a good decade. Painstakingly constructed over a period of three years, the film uses handmade cutouts against painted backgrounds to create a rich and intricate vision of the film’s fantastical setting. Even though this was a pioneering work without many of the technological advantages that would be created in the following years, the level of fine detail in some of the character animation is incredible – director Lotte Reiniger even went to the effort of creating small facial expressions for the characters. As impressive as it is in terms of close-up fidelity, the scale of the large sequences is where the film really wows – erupting mountains, dense jungle backdrops, hordes of flying demons and spectacular light shows practically jump off the screen, while the Arabian-inspired design of the costumes and creatures gives the film an eye-catching quality, the complexity and strong shapes making up for the lack of colour (aside from some single-colour tinting to separate locations). Based on an ancient folk-tale, the film sees the titular hero carried to distant lands on a flying horse, where he falls in love with the queen of demons, battles a wicked magician, befriends a monstrous witch and helps Aladdin recover his magic lamp, with each episode of the adventure escalating both the stakes of the story and the complexity of the animation. People on the internet love to shout about how “animation is cinema” and deserving of the same respect as live-action – how many of those people have watched or would even be willing to watch this genuine piece of animation history? 9/10.

Tuesday – The Crowd

Another pioneering silent film, this 1928 drama faced an uphill battle to even get made – the city setting and ambitious script required a bigger budget than studios were willing to cough up for such a non-commercial film. Fortunately, there was a contingent in Old Hollywood who understood that box office wasn’t everything, and that they could afford to lose a little cash once in a while on something that would stand the test of time. The Crowd is a very early example of a realist film – in an era where adventure and escapism dominated the medium, this was a grounded drama about ordinary life in the big city and was filmed not on extravagant studio sets, but mainly in cramped rooms. There’s even hidden-camera footage of new York City to add a real and rare-for-the-time authenticity. The Crowd is a rise-and-fall story of a perfectly ordinary man, except he doesn’t rise all that far, but he can certainly fall a long way. An office drone who dreams and dreams of a big break that will never come, the film is a tragedy of obscurity, the death of individualism in the face of the dense and over-populated modern world. The rest of the world won’t give you anything for free or slow down so you can catch up, nor will everything stop when you’re hit with some tragedy – you’ll get a sympathetic look and a kind word, sure, but that’s all you can expect. The rest of the crowd will move on regardless, so it’s a case of keep up or get lost. The emotional journey of hapless hero John is moving – he marries his dream girl Mary but takes her for granted, oblivious to how she slaves away while he idles and dreams of better things. In one pointed exchange, he defends himself by declaring that one of his slogans will eventually be bought by the advertising firm, to which she retorts that he might have better odds if he actually sent one in once in a while. The film does allow that every man gets lucky once in his life, but his success is short-lived when tragedy strikes the family. Driven to distraction by the world’s indifference to his grief, John impulsively quits his job and drags his family down into ruin, unwilling to engage with a society that won’t accommodate him and his needs. A fantastic film that, I stress again, you can pull up on Youtube for free. 9/10.

Wednesday – The Battleship Potemkin

Aboard a Russian battleship, the men are unhappy with provisions, as the meat on offer is practically rotten. But when they air their grievance, the officer assigned to arbitrate tells them they have nothing to complain about: ‘Those aren’t worms, they are only maggots. You can rinse them out with brine.’ This exchange is symbolic of the greater struggle that The Battleship Potemkin aims to represent – the working man forced to toil in unacceptable conditions and told again and again that he can’t give out because things could always be worse. When the arrogant officers at the top go too far in their oppression, the great mass of sailors rise up and cast off their chains – this is the glorious revolution, and it soon spreads to the people of the mainland, who pool together their resources to feed the sailors and send them off to aid the larger uprising in Russia. Here is another fascinating moment of rhetoric – the crowd is whipped into patriotic fervour, inspired by the example of the sailors, shouting their disapproval for the ruling class. Amidst the crowd is a group of disinterested, well-off looking types, one of whom decides to take advantage of the atmosphere by proclaiming ‘down with the Jews!’ His attempt to divert the energy of the mob is met with immediate rejection, a succession of furious expressions turning towards his voice. He tries to shrink away but it is too late, and he disappears under the fists of a crowd who are interested not in race war, but class war. This, says the film, is how you prevent the revolution from losing its way ideologically – by violently excising any voice that goes against the will of the people. Of course, the violence of the revolution goes both ways – here is the most famous sequence of the film, the massacre of the peasants on the steps, the advancing government army an inhuman mass of death. Violence in this film is conveyed not merely by images of blood and collapse, but by the speed of the editing, frantic and panicking as we only glimpse what is being done to the helpless people. The triumphant ending sees brotherhood and solidarity eliminating the need for violence, which is where the film loses the plot and tips over into fantasy – like it or not, words never won a war. The film is far more interesting when it’s being honest about the cost of revolution, though we should expect that a state-sanctioned propaganda history can only go so far. 7/10.

Thursday – The Bikeriders and Kinds of Kindness

Film festival sheen is a very real phenomenon. The feeling of seeing a film in this exclusive environment can be blinding, overpowering a work’s flaws and allowing you to convince yourself you’ve just seen something spectacular. The Bikeriders blew my mind when I saw it in the Everyman last November, and I very much enjoyed it when I saw it again last week – but I found that when it came to write my review, I was disappointed with what I produced. Despite rating it so highly, I struggled to express my praise. Seeing it again for a third time, I’ve realised why – it’s not actually that good of a film. The ideas of the narrative are impressive in abstract, but closer examination reveals a terminally disorganised structure, with major characters dropping in and out of the ultimately directionless story. The steady pace and solid performances do much to distract from this failing, but it doesn’t hold up on repeat viewings. There’s no shame in getting a rating wrong once in a while – just be open to changing your mind. I’d still recommend the film in a broad sense, but maybe if it comes on TV on a lazy Sunday. 6/10.

The new film from Yorgos Lanthimos, Kinds of Kindness, has had a very divisive reaction online. What I find fascinating is that, love it or hate it, both sides have one thing in common – they struggle to articulate why. It is the kind of film that defies explanation or categorisation – three standalone stories with a shared cast and very little in common even thematically, it’s easy to see how people could be left scratching their heads. Perhaps many of those who are disappointed were expecting to discover some insight that would unify the three tales, but this is absolutely not a puzzle box to be solved. There’s also the influence of Yorgos’ previous film to consider – Poor Things has catapulted him to a new level of recognition, and those coming here via that film (which does include myself) could reasonably have expected Kinds of Kindness to be in line with its predecessor. But while Poor Things softens its bizarre and graphic content with a gentle, uplifting message, Kinds of Kindness is much more dour and low-key. The humour is exclusively dry, the sex and nudity more clinical, the mundane settings a far cry from the cartoon mosaics of Poor Things and the intended message far more difficult to parse. Story one is about a man casting off a system of control that has manipulated his entire life only to find himself utterly lost when left to his own devices and desperate to return to the safety of obedience – is it a tragedy about the inescapability of control or a parable on the need for structure in our lives? Story two is about a husband convinced that his wife has somehow been replaced by a doppelgänger, sinking into a spiral of paranoia as his behaviour destroys his wife’s mental health – we never learn if he was correct or not. Story three is about a cult member searching for her group’s messiah while struggling to fully cut off her old life – but what does the film mean when the cult’s teachings are proven to be true? None of these questions should have an answer except the one you determine for them – here is a film that genuinely leaves things to interpretation while still feeling intentional in everything it does. Jesse Plemons and Emma Stone share protagonist duties across the three shorts, with their time in the spotlight being almost symmetrical – Plemons leads the first story as a shy and unassuming sap, with Stone appearing near the end as a friendly face who helps him figure things out. Plemons then plays an unnervingly serious cop with Stone as his suspiciously perfect wife – the baton is passed from Plemons to Stone as the POV character about halfway through this segment. Then the final story has Stone as the neurotic lead with Plemons as her dull, straight-laced sidekick who eventually disappears, leaving Stone to carry the film over the touchline alone. Each story also recasts the supporting players into roles of varying importance (highlights include Willem DaFoe as a seductive speedo-clad guru and Margaret Qualley as a business-like sugar-baby), and while the temptation may be there to join the dots and figure out what these roles and relationships may mean in the wider tapestry, each story exists perfectly in it’s own little bubble too. If you can stomach some of the unflinching cruelty and the lack of a clear emotional pay-off, there’s so much depth to be discovered in this strange and beautiful film. 10/10.

Friday – Something’s Gotta Give

Ah, the humble romcom. So simple, and yet so difficult to master. Romance isn’t enough to sell these on – there positively has to be a twist. But there can’t be just a twist – there still has to be romance. The best romcoms thread this needle, and Something’s Gotta Give is a perfect example of that. The twist – it’s about old people. Jack Nicholson grins and grimaces his way through the film as a sixty-something bachelor who never dates a woman over the age of thirty. He’s suitably caustic and unpleasant to start, and thankfully gets his comeuppance very quickly when he has a heart attack while getting it on with his latest fling. Comically charming and handsome doctor Keanu Reeves forbids him from travelling, leaving him in the care of his girlfriend’s playwright mother until he’s back on his feet. Diane Keaton is delightful in the role, a successful and independent woman who takes comfort in familiarity, thrown off her axis by Nicholson’s in-your-face attitude. She’s calm and collected, but that just makes her emotions bigger when her facade cracks – when she laughs she guffaws, and when she cries she bawls. Their forced proximity and the clash of personalities has Nicholson unexpectedly finding himself attracted to a woman his own age. When he puts on the moves, he’s smooth and charming, but not in a creepy way – it feels genuine, and turns out to be more genuine than even he expects. But when commitment rears its ugly head, we have to ask – can old dogs learn new tricks? It’s funny, engaging and surprisingly tender. 8/10.

Saturday – Jackie Brown

After the runaway success of Pulp Fiction, Tarantino knew that he couldn’t pull off the same trick twice. Not interested in repeating himself, and knowing that he had pushed his style to the limit, he set out to reinvent himself with his third feature. Jackie Brown is an intentional effort by a young filmmaker to ‘mature’ his style, and Tarantino was largely successful, even if audiences and critics weren’t as interested in this version of him. It’s a film of paradoxes – his most original film in terms of genre influences, but also his only adaptation, his least violent film, but more realistic in its depiction of violence and consequences. Jackie Brown herself is his most ‘ordinary’ protagonist, a middle-aged air hostess, but also the most exceptional in terms of what she achieves – from the moment she’s caught by the ATF she takes matters into her own hands, playing every other character in the movie for fools as she seizes her opportunity to escape her dead-end life. Her criminal ‘boss’ Ordell (one of Sam Jackson’s best roles) thinks he has the measure of her, but his imagination can only stretch so far – this is a man who sees women as trophies, the worst betrayal he thinks them capable of being ratting him out. ATF agent Michael Keaton is a little more clued in, implying near the end that he knows Jackie has done something, but his vision is too narrowly focused on the big prize, and he lets her slip by right under his nose. Only bond agent Max Cherry knows exactly what Jackie is about from the word go, but he plays along with and even facilitates her mad plan for one simple reason – he’s in love with her. It’s adorable how bashful he is in his affections, Robert Forster imbuing him with a steady, down-to-earth attitude and an unobtrusive warmth. The dialogue is still absolutely Tarantino, riddled with witticisms and tangents, and while it’s not as overtly flashy with the visuals as the rest of his work, it’s still very obviously his eye. The attempt at maturity is admirable but premature, and with his next film he pumped his style even further over the top. 9/10.

The Conversation and Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo

Gene Hackman has gradually become one of my favourite actors, each subsequent role I’ve seen him in reinforcing what an incredible screen presence he is. He does have a type – overpowering personalities that are used to getting their way and steamrolling anyone else around them. It’s what he does best, so this film was a surprising change for him. Here he practically inverts his usual image – Harry Caul is an extremely private, nervous man, the type who would rather stand quietly by and smile than confront someone directly insulting him. He keeps to himself, even his friends barely know him. He would seem to be in the perfect profession, surveillance, his meticulous and unassuming nature allowing him to blend into the background and do his work undisturbed. But his introspective nature is also a weakness – while other ‘buggers’ are outgoing and callous, Caul has too much of his own identity tied up in his job, which becomes dangerous when he dwells on the consequences of what he does. While the plot sounds like a paranoia thriller (Brian De Palma would repurpose essentially the same idea a few years later in heightened slasher Blow Out), this is more a mood piece than anything, an almost impenetrably impressionistic work. Melancholy pervades every scene, with Caul often wandering alone through empty spaces to a haunting piano melody. Visions of what he heard invade his thoughts, and his full-blown dream sequence is one of the most evocative yet simple I’ve seen on film, that universal experience of trying to talk to someone that won’t respond. His paranoia does especially spill over into full-on horror territory, but just as quickly recedes, leaving an even more affecting hollowness that persists long after the credits roll. 9/10.

Zatoichi meets Yojimbo is exactly what it says on the tin – Zatoichi meets superstar actor Toshiro Mifune reprising his role as Yojimbo from the classic film by Akira Kurosawa. For those not especially familiar with Japanese cinema, let me explain why this feels so bizarre – it’s like having Christian Bale return as Batman as a one-episode villain in the final season of The Flash show on the CW. The allegory isn’t one-to-one but I think it gets my point across, that Mifune being here as this legendary character feels shockingly out of place for the series. For the first time, Zatoichi isn’t the centre of attention, with Yojimbo essentially filling the usual ‘samurai Zatoichi will eventually fight’ role but with far more screentime than that character usually gets, as well as the baggage of being a character with two solo adventures of his own under his belt. Even as the longest film in the franchise thus far, it feels completely over-stuffed from attempting to accommodate the dual stars – it’s both a standard Zatoichi story and a psuedo-remake of Yojimbo, mashed haphazardly together. The novelty of these two titans going head to head keeps the story trucking, and it is expertly directed, with the final act especially being an absolutely outstanding sequence of action filmmaking. An enjoyable treat for fans of both characters, but a little too messy to recommend as it’s own thing. 7/10.