Film Reviews by Steve

Slow moving but suspenseful thriller set in a rare screen location; the uninhabited mountains of Tasmania... There is a strand of science fiction in the premise, with Willem Dafoe as a mercenary US biologist hired by a ruthless biotech corporation to forage into the wilderness and capture the final remaining Tasmanian Tiger.

Which is fantasy, as the last one died in a zoo in 1936- though beguilingly preserved on film. They were hunted to extinction and this eco-adventure is a lament for the malign impact of human expansion into the habitat of other species. So loggers are cutting down the rainforest, aggressively protecting their jobs.

The haunting climactic encounter between the stalker and his quarry is a sad, heartbroken elegy. But this pragmatic anti-hero is sidetracked by the tree-huggers who obstruct the deforestation, and in particular a family of offgrid neo-hippies in search of a new Woodstock. And we get some satirical sendup of these stereotypes.

There is value in the dramatic landscapes and Dafoe is convincing in the title role. It's directed with some skill (in Panavision) by Daniel Nettheim, who usually does television. The audience will be divided by their attitude to natural conservation. Yet there's a frisson of Nigel Kneale to be had from its originality and imagination.

The set up is classic noir, with a stranger  (Markku Peltola) who loses his identity and memory after a violent assault and makes a new life on the fringes of the big city, until... Well curiously, an identical story is told as an anecdote in Dashiell Hammett's novel The Maltese Falcon (1930).

But this is not San Francisco, it's Helsinki, and the events take place within the customary auteurism of writer-director Aki Kaurismäki. So there are ultra-impassive portrayals of the dry, inhibited characters. In fact, the director's own (adorable) dog gives the most animated performance on show....

Kaurismäki deals in the comedy of incongruity, with the numb responses to outrageous fortune. Plus the insidious cultural Americanism set alongside the love of rock & roll. There are the motifs of '40s noir, like the constant smoking and the nocturnal atmospherics... but with a resolute absence of glamour.

This is full of empathy and heavy with compassion and humanism. There is suspicion of the mechanisms of the state and capitalism, but faith in the kindness of strangers. It is the surge of optimism which ultimately makes this sweet parable more of a Kaurismäki picture than pure film noir. 

Number five in the long running comedy series and the best of the 70s/80s sequels. It's the one where Dreyfuss (Herbert Lom) escapes from a psychiatric hospital and commands the combined forces of international crime and espionage to murder Clouseau (Peter Sellers)...

It's busting with brilliant visual gags from the pre-credit sequence onwards, surely unequalled since the early films of Laurel and Hardy. Some are old favourites, like the anticipated assault from Kato (Burt Kwouk) but there are many new wild slapstick set pieces.

My personal favourite is Dreyfuss blowing up Clouseau's rooms while the immortal detective hovers outside, held aloft by a helium balloon... This is all crazy, cartoonish stuff, inspired by the serendipitous alliance between Sellers and writer/director Blake Edwards.

Credit is probably also due to Sellers' stunt double... The star's screen combo with Lom is sublime. Leslie-Anne Down brings considerable glamour to the later scenes. The only real downer is Henry Mancini's legendary theme music is only heard over the credits.

Australian period epic adapted from Thomas Keneally's outback novel. This in turn is loosely based on the real life murders of settlers by a mixed race Aboriginal at the start of the 20th century. These events are then situated within an undeclared war between the indigenous people and the colonials.

So it's a political film, which couldn't find an audience at home. The cruel, ignorant racism allows the approach to be broadly sympathetic to the oppressed natives, despite the horrifically bloody slaughter. Jimmie Blacksmith (Tommy Lewis) can't get a break, until he cracks, and haphazardly strikes back.

Director Fred Schepisi is a bit of a journeyman and the script isn't skilfully dramatised, though the narrative is compelling and the location photography (in Panavision) spectacular. The most effective scene is when the fugitives repair the wreckage of an ancient Aboriginal meeting place, covered in profane graffiti.

Eventually there's an editorial from a hostage schoolteacher (Peter Carroll) which lists the iniquities of the British conquistadors. Schepisi called this an Aussie western, but it's really more of a historic political drama. In prioritising the perspective of indigenous protagonists, this is ahead of its time.

*there is constant realistic racist language.

Tour de force solo performance from Tom Hardy, strapped into the driver's seat on a car journey in (more or less) real time; we hear him in multiple conversations on his carphone and in soliloquy with his deceased, deadbeat father.

And the impediment of the setup is turned into an asset... Ivan Locke is divided between his responsibilities as a construction manager and to his family. But also to a one night stand, now going into premature labour.

Writer/director Steven Knight creates an anxious, nocturnal voice within a melancholy world of dispute and isolation... loaded with relishable poetic symbolism. Though some may claim this isn't so much cinema as radio.

And yet the visuals assemble an impression of the sadness of the journey and the darkness. This is the story of a flawed man who seeks to overcome his own setbacks, in search of integrity in a country which has lost its way

Groundbreaking social realism shot on location -in b&w- against contemporary inner city riots in Paris, and inspired by the death of young men in police custody. Though perhaps because of its influence, this no longer imparts the same bruising impact as on release. Plus the lack of an overarching narrative.

It was innovative because it put unfamiliar lives on screen; the left behind immigrant families of the Parisian banlieue, and in particular the boys who turn to violent crime. We see an Arab (Saïd Taghmaoui), an African (Hubert Koundé) and a Jew (Vincent Cassel) over 24 hours of restless, futile resentment.

The actors are credible as the uneducated outsiders who cause trouble for their own community almost as much as the racist cops. Most of their scenes are bitterly comical, at least until they get hold of a revolver lost by the riot squad. There is some minor consideration of why all this is happening, but no sermons.

While writer-director Mathieu Kassovitz looks for balance, he is broadly sympathetic to the rioters. In France this offended the police and conservatives. But they are part of the problem and the trio are not presented as heroes. These same issues are still with us, but the shock of its innovation has passed.

Cheerful comedy-horror aimed at a family audience. Debut director Frank Marshall says he was inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963) and that's apparent in the coastal California location, but this is much lighter in mood and milder in shocks- and not as good. Though there is one big scare.

This is mostly for children. But it's still decent entertainment with a funny script and extremely good effects/make up. Jeff Daniel stars as an arachnophobic doctor who arrives in a picturesque small town with his nice family in the middle of an invasion of poisonous Amazonian spiders.

If this sounds like formula, maybe that's because it was produced by Steven Spielberg after he re-wrote the rules of the Hollywood family film. This is unremarkable in that context, but still fun. Daniels is a comfortable comedy dad, though Harley Jane Kozak is stuck in a duff role as his perky wife.

John Goodman as the idiot from pest control is surely there for the younger kids. Then there's an excellent support cast of familiar character actors playing the provincial eccentrics. There are few surprises- and an excess of of comic relief- but still plenty of creepy shivers.

Sombre character study adapted from a bestseller (by Janet Finch). This is an actors film led by Alison Lohman as a teenager abandoned to the mercy of Californian foster care after her single mother (Michelle Pfeiffer) goes to prison for murder.

The events mostly reflect on the child's attempts to understand and escape from this traumatic maternal relationship. Initial disquiet at the daughter's brattish personality soon falls away under the sincerity and depth of Lohman's portrayal.

Pfeiffer is too impassive as the solipsistic, freethinking mother, but there are some fertile support roles as the parental stand-ins. Renée Zellweger is easily best as a rich, mentally unstable trophy wife about to enter middle age with an errant, unloving husband.

It's voyeuristic, like emotional exploitation. Maybe even tasteful misery porn. But there's a nuanced- if sanitised- impression of what growing up in care may be like, and a nice feel for sunny, suburban Los Angeles... It’s interesting to see the resilient child change within the influence of each family.

Distressing account of male domestic violence, which is mostly in the procedural tradition of social realism, but includes some of the more suspenseful techniques of a mainstream thriller. It is incredibly harrowing, and also skilfully manipulative... Debut feature director Xavier Legrand takes us far from the Nouvelle Vague... 

A marriage breakdown leads to a bitter custody settlement. This is unsatisfactory to the former husband, who has a history of physical cruelty- though he is resolutely defended by his hunting club... He uses his legal access to his son to to maintain control of his traumatised ex-wife and their grown up daughter.

The dialogue is rudimentary and there is no music score. The long edits unravel without haste. There is just the awful tension of slowly intensifying dread. This is maintained by the realistic performances, with Denis Ménochet terrifying as the inexorable monster and Thomas Gioria heartbreaking as the vulnerable boy.

The ultimate conclusion is the mother (Léa Drucker) and her children are unforgivably exposed by a complacent judge, and the law which doesn't go far enough to protect the victims. A warning is appropriate... this is very credible. After the nerve-shredding climax, I cried actual tears. The release is so intense.

Unblinking look at violent teenage gangs, loosely based on writer-director Peter Mullan's own experiences growing up on a Glasgow council estate in the early '70s. And he establishes himself as the successor to Ken Loach in the dynasty of British social realism.

His miracle is to make this brutally authentic without being so sickening it's impossible to watch. Well, there is aggro, but no gore. There is plenty of funny-but-grim humour. And there is some consideration of why all this is happening, but without the editorials.

And this is also made watchable by a mesmerising performance by newcomer Conor McCarron as the schoolkid who suddenly grows big and goes wild inside a few weeks one summer and traumatises everyone around him. Including his scary/abusive/alcoholic dad, played by the director.  

You can actually sense the siren of migraine-inducing white noise going off inside the boy's head. This is a candidate for the most convincing teenage delinquent picture ever made. And plenty have tried. Though it's too harrowing for entertainment and good luck with the accents.

*includes constant swearing.

Anti-bloodsports docudrama adapted from Henry Williamson's 1927 novel. It's set in this period, before otters had the legal protection which saved them from extinction. It takes place over a year in the birth and short life of Tarka within his habitat on the rivers of North Devon.

Nature lives in a kind of balance, except for the human hunters who kill for recreation. They are portrayed as ignorant lickspittles or complacent aristocrats. But this is more about the wildlife. Anyone of a certain age will notice how influential this was on kids' tv. And is usually rated a family film.

Except the body count is off the chart...  it's just that none of the victims are human. We observe at length the otters as predators. While all the animals are heavily anthropomorphised, this is still realistic; red in tooth and claw. This is not Disney.

The gorgeously photographed scenes from the riverbank are set to Peter Ustinov's avuncular, poetic narration. Apparently Williamson was not opposed to bloodsports, but this film clearly is. And there is a palpable sense of wonder for the otters and their precarious lives. 

This was released around the start of the slow decline of the Hollywood western, and its development problems suggest reasons why they went out of favour. It was made by Burt Lancaster's production company who wanted a traditional action adventure- shot in Panavision and Technicolor.

But director-for-hire John Huston made the plot about the conflict between the settlers and indigenous tribes into a parable about the emerging civil rights movement. And it seems they undermine each other. It's neither a quality classic western, nor the work of an auteur filmmaker.

Huston intended the kind of progressive, revisionist western which became standard in the '60s, but it is compromised. What mostly remains is an abundance of tiresome, melodramatic chat divided by the usual stunts; like breaking in the wild horses and fighting off an 'Indian' attack.

There's also a problem with Audrey Hepburn- a Belgian aristocrat- playing a foundling who may be a Kiowa native; plus she goes missing after breaking her spine falling off a horse... Still Lancaster as her cattleman step-brother brings some star charisma and it's a buzz to see Lillian Gish as the matriarch. 

Offbeat comedy-drama which is more concerned with the thematic content than prompting any laughter. Viggo Mortenson gives an Oscar nominated performance as a fearless/hubristic liberal intellectual who elects to rear his six children off-grid rather than within the conformity of mainstream society.

Only when their estranged wife/mother dies, they leave the arboreal wilderness for the funeral and the kids are exposed to the epidemic of obesity and materialism which is modern life. There is some fun to be had with this culture clash comedy which soon vanishes when dad starts to re-evaluate.

They whimsically celebrate Noam Chomsky day rather than Christmas, and find solutions in dogmatic socialism, which will probably prove divisive... Personally, these are rational conclusions... And surely, the analysis of lifestyle and childrearing for causes of the surge in mental illness is topical?

And that's without writer/director Matt Ross taking on social media. The narrative runs a little wild in the last third, and becomes more of a fantasy. But the impression of an actual family bound together by unorthodox values and experiences is really quite palpable. I'd happily watch their further adventures....

* the frequent swearing means this may not be family viewing.

The message is the whole reason this film got made; it is agitprop which promotes the objectives of radical eco-activists who engage in newsworthy and disruptive direct action to hi-jack public debate.  But it is also a well made and suspenseful thriller with interesting plot twists.

The title tells the story, which conforms to the standard heist narrative: a gang of contrasting personalities evolve a criminal plan; and then we observe the  enterprise come into contact with reality. Usually the caper falls apart in the third act. But this holds back a few surprises for the exciting climax.

There's a skilfully assembled script  with realistic dialogue. While it ostentatiously supports the aims of the green movement, it isn't dogmatic. There's a lo-fi aesthetic and no stars, but it doesn't look homemade. The young ensemble cast make the activists feel authentic, and the many flashbacks give them depth.

This is also about a generation which is angry, but has lost faith in party politics. These issues are emotive and will divide the audience subject to their own convictions. But it is more than a conveyance for a manifesto and isn't actual guerrilla film making. It is a compelling political thriller, but with a message. 

Harrowing account of slavery in 19th century Louisiana, USA, adapted from a contemporary memoir by Solomon Northup, a free black man from New York State who was kidnapped and sold into bondage. This is as much a historic record as a screen drama and on both terms, it is a significant success.

It was also a huge box office hit and major award winner, including the Oscar for Best Film and a well deserved nomination for Chiwetel Ejiofor as Northup; his long gaze into the camera might be a challenge for us not to look away. The strong support cast is led by Lupita Nyong'o as the sexual chattel of the landowner.

And there are cameos from familiar Hollywood names. The narrative doesn't deliver any surprises. Apparently slave memoirs were mostly documentation. This is a more psychological approach which deals in the religious hypocrisy, the greed and the sheer bullheaded ignorance which kept the system rolling.

And the horrific trauma. Including how cruelty degrades those on either end of the lash. These themes clearly relate to bigotry for political and commercial reward in our present time. So it is topical. There is also a detailed production with a fine (Oscar winning) script. Sure, it's a history lesson, but also a quality film.