The Death of Stalin

This 2017 comedy completely passed me by and I picked it up on the basis of director Armando Iannucci’s subsequent adaptation of David Copperfield.  As the title suggests, this film takes the death of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in 1953 and the behind-the-scenes fight for power that various years later led to Khruschev eventually asserting control.

  Iannucci transforms this episode into the darkest of satires and gives us a hilarious look at dictatorships, of the often ridiculous and horrendous actions that authoritarian governments take.

  No wonder the Russians have refused to show this movie.  It shows up the excesses and false steps of the Soviet politburo and gives us a belly laugh at the same time. 

 The script developed from a cartoon series is packed with small very pertinent observations and the director knows how to keep up a smart pace.  On top of this and the absurd but mostly accurate situations, we have an excellent cast of actors giving life to the historical figures.

Simon Russell Beale, a famous theatre actor is superb as the NKVD secret police head Beria,

Steve Buscemi matches him as his rival Khruschev, Michael Palin shines as the wimpy Molotov,

Jason Isaac has a good part as famed soldier Marshall Zhukov, Jeffrey Tambor shocks as the ineffective second-in-command Malenkov

and Andrea Riseborough as Svetlana, Stalin’s daughter and Rupert Friend as his son all add valuable compositions to the mix. 

Good cinematography by Zac Nicholson and music by Christopher Willis.

I really couldn’t find much to fault in this film.  We need more of this type of satire.

4 star 2 plusses

The Life Ahead

This throwback film in the sense of being the remake of an old style of movie doesn’t throw up much in the way of innovation but is an accomplished feelgood experience with some tears thrown in.

The original version was Madame Rosa starring Simone Signoret in one of her last performances and I saw it but don’t remember much.  Edoardo Ponti has shifted the setting to Bari, a sunny but rather bare Southern Italian port where an agglomeration of races meet and cast his mother Sophia Loren as the lead.

  Sophia is now 86 and is impressive in this unglamorous role.  What is more, she plays it in an understated way when it could have been much more histrionic and theatrical.  Rosa is an Auschwitz survivor and former prostitute who now looks after the children of younger women who are on the hustle or have abandoned their kids.

  She currently has two, Iosif, whose Romanian mother has disappeared and Babu, son of Lola, a Spanish trans hooker, played by Abril Zamora.

  Along comes Momo, a 12-year-old from Senegal, orphaned and making extra money selling drugs for an older man.  An elderly Jewish doctor entrusts him to Rosa so we also have the Jewish-Muslim question in play.  Momo and Rosa begin with a fractious relationship but they slowly begin to understand and appreciate each other and Momo also gets closer to a Muslim man he is sent by Rosa to help out.

  Babak Karimi is effective here.  

Ibrahima Gueye in his first role as Momo is a natural and like Loren gives an authentic performance in a film that could have been much more clichéd.

  Nice music by Gabriel Yared and a theme song by Diane Warren and Laura Pausini.

Nothing earth shattering but a solid film for a wet Sunday.

3 stars plus

One Night in Miami

Another Oscar-nominated re-creation of black history this year.  Great to see screen time given to these events but do they all have to be this year?  I wonder. The problem is not the topic but the samey nature of the offer.  Again, we have a stage play converted into a film with long speeches and most of the action taking place in a hotel room though unlike Ma Rainey we did have some more outside scenes shown as flashbacks.

The one night is an evening following the victory of Cassius Clay to become the world heavyweight titleholder in which Clay (soon to become Muhammad Ali), Malcolm X, Jim Brown, a top footballer and Sam Cooke, a top singer get together to celebrate in a hotel room and discuss what it is like being a black male role model in that time.

  The event actually happened but we do not know what was said or took place.  It is more an affirmation of friendship, of brotherhood than a party, reflecting the serious Malcolm X’s Muslim stance more than anything.

I also found that this film took a while to get going and it is only when Malcolm X takes Sam Cooke to task for selling out to the whites in his music that the story really gets interesting.  I guess it gains in poignancy too since these two are to die within a year of the meeting.

In a way, I found the film artificial but in another way it was good to get a glimpse into the priorities of these men at this moment of racial change and protest and to reflect on how little has changed for many in the 57 years since then.

Regina King directs competently, Kingsley Ben-Adir is a convincing Malcolm X and Leslie Odom Junior does a good job with Sam Cooke, including singing the songs.  Kemp Powers’ screenplay is interesting if not quite brilliant.

3 stars plus

Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom

This much awarded Oscar nominee is not an easy film for me to assess and partly the Rotten Tomatoes split between almost unanimous adulation by the critics and a somewhat more lukewarm public response hints at this difficulty.  Sure, it has several excellent features but overall, I found it harder to get caught up in.  Essentially, the fact that this started life as a play is one aspect that affects my opinion.  

For a film, although there is not much good reason to go beyond the various rooms of a Chicago recording studio in the 1920’s, I feel that we are constrained by the setting and the theatrical nature of various soliloquies and set speeches during the film.  It plays like something I want to see on stage rather than on film. It is too determinedly theatrical and not filmic in its nature.  August Wilson’s play is similar to his other filmed play “Fences”; ideas and messages conveyed by actors in a stage-like context.  Almost Shakespearian and we all know how hard it is to turn a Shakespeare play into a satisfying movie experience.

That said, the messages are relevant and poignant and there is no doubting the quality of the dialogue and the acting.  Direction and photography do well but at the end of the day it is still a filmed play, even with superb make up conveying the clingy heat of a hot summer’s day.

The two lead actors tower over an already able cast here.  

Viola Davis is unrecognisable as the blowsy Ma Rainey, a popular music-hall singer among the blacks and a hard nut to negotiate with as the white studio owner discovers.  She is here to bring her talent to the recording of her music which will make the record company loads more money than she will see.  And she intends to fight for her own rights all the way and show them who is boss.  What I admired of Davis’s performance is the physicality of it all, a sweaty, overweight woman.  You can just about smell the perspiration and cheap make-up.  Few critics have mentioned this aspect of her performance which is terms of voice and looks is commanding and quite unlike anything I’ve seen her do.

Chadwick Boseman, in his last role, plays a trumpeter called Levee who is part of the backing band, much younger than his colleagues and with a chip on his shoulder for very good reasons as we later learn.  

Boseman has some plum speeches but what impresses is how he conveys them with such passion and nuance and yet at the same time somehow seeming restrained and underplayed.  This role was a great opportunity for the actor to show his talent and he definitely made the most of it with a character that is basically tragic and not entirely likeable.

In conclusion then, this is a very well made production that is good enough to be seen on celluloid even though it’s natural home would seem to be on the boards.

4 stars

A Suitable Boy (series)

This month I watched the six-part series from the BBC, A Suitable Boy.  Based on a long, prize-winning novel by Vikram Seth, the series is set in India of the early 1950’s as the country comes to grips with its new independence and already sees the emergence of the friction between Hindus and Muslims. The first praise I have to give is to Andrew Davies, the series writer who manages to condense a rambling and chock-full novel into a manageable slice of Indian life with an extensive caste.

The main storyline revolves around Lata Mehra (Tanya Maniktala),

a young university student whose mother, widow Mrs Rupa Mehra (Mahira Kakkar) deems should be married.  She has just wedded off her older daughter to a university professor and Lata is next in line. And so, we accompany her on the search for “a suitable boy”. These include Amit, a poet from Calcutta and Haresh Khanna (Namit Das), an ambitious shoemaker.

  Initially, Lata’s eyes however are on Kabir Durrani (Danesh Razvi), a handsome fellow student and local cricket star.  Unfortunately, he is Muslim and the mood in the country is very much moving away from any tolerance towards mixed marriages.

  So, there is a lot of criss-crossing of India in pursuit of the perfect match, with family dramas and plenty of comedy thrown in.

The other main storyline features the in-laws of Mrs Mehra, the Kapoors.  

Mahesh Kapoor (Ram Kapoor) is a Hindu politician with close ties to Muslim leaders and with a plan to introduce a new land law to limit the exploitation by the feudal owners of the rural poor.  

His son Maan (Ishaan Khattar) is a handsome passionate young man who is somewhat adrift in life and to complicate matters in love with Saeeda Bai (Tabu), an older woman who is courtesan of some famous men and a recognised singer of local music.

  Maan’s romance becomes embroiled in his father’s political ambitions with some unpredictable and dramatic consequences.  

This second storyline with its dose of political realism balances up the sugary romance of Lata’s story.

While people may have some quibbles with the overall balance of the story and feel it is a bit Downton Abbeyesque, I think that director Mira Nair and screenplay writer Davies have done a good job at keeping it as uncomplicated as possible, even if it takes a couple of episodes to sort everyone  out.

Nair brings a very artistic touch to the series in the form of superb photography (Declan Quinn), appropriate music (Alex Heffes, Anoushka Shankar (daughter of Ravi)) and beautiful costumes.

  And yet, the dirt and grime and poverty are still present in all the beauty.  Recreation of the times seems authentic and even fight scenes and a stampede are well depicted despite perhaps a lack of a cast of millions.

The acting is uniformly convincing, even with the slightly overdone comic aspects of some characters.

I now want to reread the book but feel that Seth can feel well pleased with this faithful adaptation to the screen.  A pity that there won’t be a series two as the characters and situation definitely provide plenty of material.

4 stars

Tina

Very much an authorised documentary about the rock icon who is now 81 and living in a beautiful Swiss mansion. 

 Tina has made it.  Her story is astonishing.  Abandoned by her parents in the cotton picking village of Nutbush, Tennessee, she began singing and was picked up by one Ike Turner who used her to song alongside him in his rock bands of the early 60’s.  

The singing partnership quickly turned into marriage and children with Tina taking over the care of two of his children while also supporting him in his work.  And as is often the case, he was clearly jealous that much of the attention on the band was focused on her.

After 16 years together and constant abuse from Ike, she finally walked out and set about making a new life for herself, doing Vegas and TV to support the boys. 

This documentary is living proof that when you want something badly enough it will come about somehow.  Or at least in this case, it does! Tina dreamed of filling stadiums with rock music and after being picked up by a British producer she goes on to record “What’s love got to do with it?, Private Dancer and a whole hit album and her rise to superstardom is gaining momentum.

  All in her late 40’s.  For another 25 years she tours the world, an idol for her fans, a survivor with a way of impregnating her music with emotion and experience.

This documentary deals with the Ike side although she says she is tired of talking about it.  The trouble is that this part of the story is so integral to her overall success.  Then we see the rise to world fame and the golden years.

She’s clearly a very hard worker, a born entertainer and someone with a clear idea of what she deserved, despite the appalling start she had in life.

We get a lot of authentic footage here, some testimony from managers, backing singers, producers, journalists and the likes of Angela Bassett who played her in the movie of her life.  It is all quite tastefully done and ends up with the new musical of her life which opened on Broadway in 2019.  Tina’s way of tidying ends up before moving out of the public eye. 

All very neat.  Enjoyable to watch but perhaps lacking a little spontaneity.

4 stars (just)

Promising Young Woman

I didn’t have tremendous expectations of this despite the award nominations and reviews and I wouldn’t have classed myself among the fans of Carey Mulligan prior to this.  However, I must say that I was agreeably surprised by this film and would rate it among the best so far this year.

Emerald Fennell shows that she has the skills to tell a story and keep us guessing right through the end.  What starts out as a sort of revenge film of the #me too era moves through different generic phases: comedy, romance, drama, thriller.  

Some critics have disliked the tonal variety but to me it fitted the lead character perfectly.

  Cassie is struggling to keep it altogether and suffers from mood swings.  And it does seem to reflect the times we are enduring. In this unpredictable and creatively told story Fennell has plenty to show us about continuing sexist attitudes in society, which seem to linger despite a certain wokeness.

Mulligan is full on in the lead role and totally credible as the ambiguous and slightly unhinged ex-medical student.

  The strain of the years retaining a sense of resentment at what happened to her best friend certainly show.  

Bo Burnham is a credible love interest and the other characters represent different aspects of men and women’s reactions to the harassment of women.

But most of all Fennell has remembered that films also need to entertain and this movie undoubtedly does.

4 stars ++

Judas and the Black Messiah

Judas and the Black Messiah is not a particularly easy watch.  At the beginning I felt the lack of knowledge and context.  I was aware that the Black Panthers were a terrorist organization from the late 60’s in the US, that branches of the government were very much against them and that the Panthers had some sympathy from certain well-known figures.  I guess I bought the government whitewash.

What new director Shaka King does with this film is take one significant episode in the history of the Panthers, the murder of one of their charismatic leaders, Fred Hampton, in 1969.  To do this, we get context.  Hampton is a very young firebrand leader of the Chicago chapter. The FBI and the Chicago police are after him so they plant a spy inside the organising committee, a young car thief called Bill O’Neal.  

He quickly proves his use as driver and handyman and becomes a sort of right-hand man to Hampton, all the while reporting back to Roy Mitchell (Jesse Plemons)

leading the FBI charge on behalf of its evil leader J Edgar Hoover (a garishly made-up Martin Sheen).  

As the months pass we see the other side of the Black Panther, community kitchens and educational projects not just for blacks but for all the underprivileged. 

 Imagine the FBI´s distaste of Hampton creating a rainbow coalition of disaffected white people and farming communities.  And we see Hampton’s romance with fellow comrade Deborah Johnson (excellent Dominique Fishback), which ends up in their having a baby born after Hampton’s death.

Perhaps I found the first half or so a little heavy as we set all this up, despite the excellent scenes of Hampton’s oratory.

But once we head into the final straight where Hampton’s demise is imminent the pace picks up and moments of poignancy and outrage invade the screen.  Certainly, the state acted in ‘overkill’ and in the raid leading to the death of two of the Panthers, 99 shots are fired by police and agents and 1 by the “terrorists”. As someone said, the State (yet again) are the real terrorists here and while some compensation was granted in a court case ten years later, the state was never really held accountable for this excess.  The Panthers are no saints either, young, idealistic but hell-bent on revolution.  And yet you ask yourself why governments sometimes go to such lengths and such illegalities (covered up in lies afterwards) in actions which are basically no more than the murder of fellow citizens.

The nuances are increased in this film with the central role of O’Neal as the infiltrator and traitor – the Judas – who gets trapped into betraying a cause that he starts to realise he actually supports.  Or so it seems.  The confusion, contradictions, fears and naivety of O’Neal are superbly captured by LaKeith Stanfield in a performance of considerable subtlety.

  He deserves more nominations for awards than he has got.  The problem is that Daniel Kaluuya as Hampton is SO magnetic that Stanfield has to work hard on us to earn our attention.  

Both are performances sure to be among the best by year’s end.  And while King still has things to learn about storytelling, this film is a very solid debut and will be watched and studied plenty in the future.  With a Best Song nominee by H.E.R. what more could you want?

Good movie, an important contribution to the current revision of the treatment of blacks in the US.  Surely, the George Floyd movie will follow in a few short years.

4 stars

This Town

A Kiwi black comedy that starts off rather rockily but gets slowly better.  The topic is a touchy one.  

Sean (David White who also writes and directs) is a country bumpkin type living off the proceeds of odd jobs in Hawkes Bay farming country.  He was accused of killing his whole family in a mass murder but acquitted on lack of evidence.  

Pam (Robyn Malcolm) ex-local cop is determined to nail him for once and for all and conducts her private investigation, while fanning up interest in the cold case via the media.  Sean falls in love with Casey via a dating app and the two of them look set for marriage. Not if Pam can help it!

The similarity to a well-known NZ murder case makes this a sensitive topic, however much we might want accused murderers to be able to live a normal life after the event.  White handles it with dry Kiwi humour that I found fairly unamusing.  The puns were at times very obvious and I only really laughed out loud once.  I also felt that much of the humour was directed at the stereotypical characters rather than having us also feel some love for them, however stupid or narrow-minded they might seem. 

It was all a strange match and only perhaps the denouement and feel good ending managed to set the film on an even keel.  The other big plus the film has is the presence of Robyn Malcolm, veteran TV actor in NZ who takes an unlikeable and potentially clichéd character and makes her believable.

There are some great cameos from Rima Te Wiata as the muck raking journalist, Danny Mulheron, a small-town lawyer, Catherine Wilkin and Peter 

McCauley, all well experienced Kiwi actors and there are some good supporting performances from younger actors all within a fairly hackneyed range (Muriel´s Wedding type).  Alice May Connolly as Casey convinces while David White, the man himself, comes across as rather too underplayed for my liking.

OK music and great scenery but ultimately just a small-town comedy.

2 stars

The Little Things

Given quite a few buckets of cold water by the critics, this old-fashioned LA-based detective thriller is not so bad.  It doesn’t have much pace but there is quite a bit of intrigue and three stars to watch. Denzel Washington, fattened up for the part of a semi-retired back-room cop, ends up going to LA on an errand and becomes involved in a serial killer case that resembles one he was involved in several years previously, which incidentally due to a botch up in the investigation led him to his exile from the city. 

Now, his job as chief investigator is help by Jim Baxter, played by Rami Malek.  

After initial suspicion, they end up pooling their efforts to catch the serial killer, who seems to be a one Albert Sparma (Jared Leto).  

Given the fact that Deacon (Washington) has a muddy past, Sparma claims he is innocent and Baxter is clearly not the hotshot detective he thinks he is, the film meanders onwards towards some kind of resolution.

Some of the main criticisms of the movie are the slow pace and the 90’s simplicity.  It is set in the 90’s but it is not a bad thing for us to have the odd movie filmed in that style again.  They don’t have to be all tech-modern and frenetic or gory.  I rather liked the recreation which reminded me of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Washington holds it all together beautifully and gives us a nuanced performance as the older cop. 

 I felt Leto was rather one-dimensional and Malek frequently seemed out of place, even if that was partly his character.  He is an interesting character with a dominant lip expression that is rather ambiguous.  At times I felt he was the bad guy.

Good music and adequate direction, the movie has its problems but was an acceptable couple of hours returning in time.

3 stars