Carnage

Carnage is a film which I was persuaded to watch after a recommendation from a friend. It basically revolves around four characters: two sets of parents who have come together to talk out the issue of their two boys having a fight. One child has hit the other with a stick, and the parents are discussing what the best thing to do is. Throughout the film we see more and more of the character of these individuals, and we see shifting dynamics among the four of them, as well as more and more childish actions.

The highlight of the film for me was Christoph Waltz. I've only recently discovered Waltz's talents, but I think he’s a fantastic actor. He plays the father of the boy who has attacked the other. Throughout the film he is attached to his phone, only communicating with the others through generally sarcastic or snide comments, and providing me with a source of near-constant amusement. His character is devoted to his work, and Waltz does an excellent job of reflecting the kind of father who is too busy to really care what his child does. His response to the ‘destruction’ of his phone perfectly reflects how broken he is without it. Also, when his wife is sick he spends more of his time worrying about the state of his suit and doesn't even ask if she is okay. His character remains vaguely constant throughout the film, providing an amusing antagonistic note to Jodie Foster on many occasions.

Jodie Foster plays the mother of the attacked child, and for me, she is wonderful. Some consider her to be ‘over-the-top’ in this role, but I think she does magnificently. Her character is just the over-concerned, over-protective mother everyone has had experience of at some point. Her concern for her son and her moral beliefs become somewhat accentuated throughout the film, and Foster does an excellent job. She clearly regards the other parents as lesser to her and comes across as a very strong mother initially. However, there are continual signs of weakness, most obviously when the alcohol starts to come out. On occasion she makes very pointed and forked comments about the incident in defence of her son, and her very maternal attitude is in direct contrast to Kate Winslet.

Kate Winslet comes across as the perfect wife for Christoph Waltz. She too is a career-driven woman and considers the talk that these four parents are having to be little more than a distraction from her work. However, in many ways she is the fulcrum of the film. It is her that is sick (hilarious, by the way), producing the first major conflict. It is her that walks out on numerous occasions. It is her who flies off the handle and drops her husband’s phone into the water. She is often the source of many of the conflicts. Her attitude starts out as very reconciliatory but as the film progresses she becomes much more likely her husband. Towards the end of the film she comes across much more of an infant, and her reaction to her bag being thrown reflects much about her as a character. Kate Winslet also shines in this role, and her antagonism of John C. Reilly is almost a direct parallel of her husband’s antagonism of Jodie Foster.

John C. Reilly is an interesting addition to this film. It is quite a change from many of his other films, but he is marvellous in it nonetheless. His character undergoes perhaps the most dramatic change throughout the course of the film. He starts off as a very welcoming and loving father, but there are obvious cracks beneath the surface, and his attitude towards vermin is another source of conflict. However, he soon develops into a thoroughly dislikeable character that shows little consideration for anyone else in his life, with the possible exception of his mother. His character change causes the group dynamic to change, resulting in a gender split to the group.

The whole dynamic of the group is magnificently set up by Roman Polanski, and I think that ‘Carnage’ is one of his better films. The alliance shifts and character developments are a joy to watch and I’m quite surprised that it wasn’t nominated for any Academy Awards. I think it is quite a subtle film but one that is very enjoyable once you get into the nitty-gritty of it. Browsing through some of the films that were nominated for Best Picture in 2011, there are a couple of recognisable films, but none that fly off the screen at me. I think Carnage is good enough to have been nominated, and at least good enough for one of the actors to receive a nomination.

I think Carnage is a good film, and one that I’m glad I was recommended. I can only pass on the recommendation to you reader. I would strongly suggest that you see this film, not because it’s a Hollywood blockbuster, not because it has a deep underlying meaning or anything like that. I think you should watch it because it is enjoyable. 

The 85th Academy Awards Special

Well it was the Academy Awards last night, and while I wasn't able to watch the ceremony, I was following avidly on twitter. There were a few surprises, a few obvious winners, and a few questionable decisions, but that was to be expected. Life of Pi turned out to be the big winner, bagging 4 awards having been nominated for 11. I’m going to attempt to give you a few of my thoughts on the winners and losers, and I’m going to skip over a few of the awards that it would be wrong for me to talk about.

So, not having seen any of the films in the category, I don’t feel suitably qualified to talk about Best Live Action Short Film, Best Animated Short Film, Best Feature Documentary, Best Short Subject Documentary, or Best Animated Feature. What I will say though is that it didn't surprise me that Brave won this award.

In terms of the award for Best Visual Effects there was only going to be one winner for me. While the visual effects in The Hobbit, The Avengers and Prometheus were incredible (and I haven’t seen Snow White and the Huntsman so I can’t comment on that), Life of Pi absolutely eclipses anything that these films could do. This was perhaps the most obvious winner of the night for me, and it completely deserves its success. Life of Pi also won the award for Best Cinematography which I thought was interesting. This was perhaps one of the closest awards of the night, because any of the five nominees (Life of Pi, Anna Karenina, Django Unchained, Lincoln and Skyfall) could feasibly have won. After I saw Anna Karenina, and after slating the film because I thought it to be very weak, the best thing I could say about it was that the cinematography was brilliant. However, that doesn't mean that the cinematography of Life of Pi wasn't  and so this is another deserved award. In terms of Best Original Score, I thought Life of Pi was, again, a deserving winner. The other films in this category just didn't quite match up for me, and Mychael Danna deserves the credit (and the award) for creating the soundtrack for Life of Pi. Finally, Ang Lee won the Best Director award for Life of Pi, and I have to say I was a bit surprised at this. I was sure Steven Spielberg would be nailed on for this award for Lincoln. However, having seen Life of Pi, I’m sure there are very few that would begrudge Ang Lee his second award for Best Director.

Lincoln bagged two awards last night, after having been nominated for 12. For many people, Lincoln was the favourite to sweep the board and win more than it did. Now I haven’t seen Lincoln, so I’m going to have to keep this relatively brief. In terms of Best Production Design I’m sure the production of Lincoln was fantastic, but Life of Pi, Les Miserables and The Hobbit are all films which are fantastically produced. I’m sure that this decision is justified, but I need to see it to make a judgement. Believe me, Lincoln is high up the ‘films I want to see’ list. I didn't think the decision to hand Daniel Day-Lewis the Best Actor award was particularly surprising. At the end of the day, Bradley Cooper was never going to win for a rom-com, and Hugh Jackman for me, didn't do enough to be considered a deserving winner. From the bits I have seen of Lincoln, Daniel Day-Lewis is marvellous and is definitely deserving of this award.

Ben Afleck’s film Argo won three awards, including the big one, Best Picture. Again, I haven’t seen Argo, but I mean to, and so my comments will have to be speculative. Best Film Editing is probably deserved, and I didn't think that Zero Dark Thirty or Life of Pi should have won it (as these two were the second favourites for me). I have no major objections to Argo winning Best Adapted Screenplay, but I thought Life of Pi was unlucky to miss out. The adaptation of Argo from the sources that it is based on is fantastic, and likewise, Life of Pi is fantastically adapted from the book. Now Argo was widely tipped to win the Best Picture award, and of the front runners (I thought that Les Miserables, Life of Pi, Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty were all in with a shout) any of them would be deserving winners. It is a fantastic achievement for Ben Afleck, and settles much of the debate around the Zero Dark Thirty versus Argo arguments. This year though there were a couple of surprises on the nominations list. Silver Linings Playbook raised a lot of eyebrows for its inclusion, as did Amour, and I don’t think either of these were in with a chance. Django Unchained deserved its nomination but it was a bit too controversial to ever really win, and in the end, Argo is probably a very good winner.

Now there are a lot of awards that I don’t really have anything to say about at all. Anna Karenina won Best Costume Design, and yes, the costumes were good in it. Les Miserables won Best Makeup and Hairstyling, and yes, the makeup and hairstyling is very good. Les Miserables also won Best Sound Mixing, which was good. Best Sound Editing caused a bit of a stir as it was the sixth time in the history of the Academy Awards (85 different ceremonies) that two films have been tied for an award. Skyfall (the first Bond film to win an OSCAR) and Zero Dark Thirty won this award, and of the other nominations (Argo, Django Unchained and Life of Pi) I think any of them could have won, because the sound editing was very good in all of them. Skyfall also won the award for Best Original Song, adding another award to Adele’s growing list. This can’t have been a surprise as it was in the charts for such a long time that it was bound to win. Amour won Best Foreign Language Film which isn't surprising considering it was the most widely known on the list. Anne Hathaway won Best Supporting Actress for Les Miserables and this was so unsurprising that I’m fairly sure that if I were a bookie I would have paid out on this before the ceremony began.

On a more positive note, Christoph Waltz won Best Supporting Actor for his role in Django Unchained, and I feel this is definitely deserved. He is simply glittering in the roles that Tarantino writes for him. His mix of humour and incredible acting means that he stands out from the other nominees as the best supporting actor from 2012. This represents a much more light-hearted victor from the Academy, with Tommy Lee Jones many people’s (including mine) favourite choice for the award. Another tip of the hat goes to Quentin Tarantino and Django Unchained for winning Best Original Screenplay. This was up against a number of excellent films like Amour, Flight and Zero Dark Thirty, and winning this award is a move towards a greater appreciation for the comedic yet controversial bloody movie that Tarantino specialises in. I think Zero Dark Thirty was unlucky not to win this award, but Django Unchained is definitely the one to lose out to.

Finally, I thought the decision to give Jennifer Lawrence the award for Best Actress for her role in Silver Linings Playbook was very strange. While it will guarantee her a successful career more than her role in The Hunger Game could ever do I thought that Jessica Chastain was fantastic in Zero Dark Thirty. Now I’m not saying that she did not deserve the award, and I haven’t seen Silver Linings Playbook, so I can’t possibly comment, but I guess when you have nominations for the film in the Best Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, and Supporting Actor categories the film is doing something right.

As I mentioned, the big winner was Life of Pi with four awards. However I feel that everyone associated with Zero Dark Thirty can be disappointed not to have won more. There is no doubt that this year’s Academy Awards was incredibly close and many films appeared in several different categories, meaning that one would always come off worse. Before I finish writing I would just like to mention the In Memoriam part of the ceremony. Jack Klugman (appeared in 12 Angry Men and Quincy ME), Ernest Borgnine (the original voice of SpongeBob), Eiko Ishioka (winner of Best Costume Design for Bram Stoker’s Dracula in 1992), Richard Zanuck (Driving Miss Daisy) and Larry Hagman (Dallas) all passed away this year, and all will be remembered for their contributions to cinema. Finally, and if nothing else, spare a thought for Michael Clarke Duncan whose most notable film is The Green Mile. He passed away in September at the age of 54 from a heart attack, and he will be sorely missed.

Inglorious Basterds

Inglorious Basterds is another film from the imagination of Quentin Tarantino. The combination of humour, blood and storyline (all trademark Tarantino) combine to produce what I consider to be a classic Tarantino film which is unmissable for any film fan.

The film follows a group of Jewish soldiers who kill Nazis, who meet up with a German film star in a plot to kill a number of high ranking Nazis at the premier of a German propaganda film. The owner of the cinema has the same idea, and driven by the murder of her family by the Nazis, plots to burn down her cinema. What none of them know though is that Hitler himself will be at the premier.

The Basterds, as the group of Jewish soldiers are known, often ambush Nazi soldiers, and deliver their scalps to their leader in ‘payment’. This provides the majority of the signature blood in the film, and by Tarantino’s standards it’s quite a tame film. Compared to the recent Django Unchained, or the Kill Bill films, there is a lot less blood. The story is told masterfully, and as usual, it all comes together to produce a fantastic finale. With some hilarious characters, some serious and some sinister ones, Inglorious Basterds is very enjoyable.

Brad Pitt stars as the leader of the Basterds, and his trademark of cutting a swastika into the heads of the Nazis that survive his ambushes provides the last laugh at the end of the film. His acting is fantastic, and the accent that he puts on throughout the movie absolutely completes the character he plays. The scene where he is masquerading as an Italian had me in stitches.

Throughout the film Brad Pitt is a source of humour, but he does have a serious side to his character, and this is refreshing to see. Also, the characters of Donny Donowitz (the Bear Jew) and Hugo Stiglitz add a level of violence to the group which perfectly reflects their ferocity, as well as producing that little bit of humour that Tarantino seems to revel in.

The most sinister character in the film is undoubtedly Colonel Hans Landa. Christoph Waltz magnificently pulls off the changeable nature of the character he is portraying. I found myself a little bit apprehensive about what Landa’s reaction was going to be in many different situations, and this is a reflection on how good Waltz is. Landa is the kind of man who just looks out for himself, and is also a source of amusement at times. However, he is at his most sinister in the beginning. When the young Jewish girl escapes the mass murder and runs across the field, Landa draws and aims his gun. I found myself thinking he was genuinely going to shoot her from such range, and this is both brilliant acting and fantastic direction. Having since seen Django Unchained, I began to realise how incredible Waltz is as an actor, and upon a tip from a friend, I’m going to endeavour to see more of his films.

There are a number of other big names in Inglorious Basterds, such as Michael Fassbender, who plays the British lieutenant initially charged with meeting the German film star for the attack on the premier. For me he does very well in this role, and the scene where he is conversing with the German soldier in the bar is very tense. His stereotypical British character is also quite amusing and I was disappointed that his character was killed off when he did because I was enjoying seeing him in the film. Similarly, Diane Kruger was a joy to watch as the German film star Bridget von Hammersmark, and in my opinion she was flawless in this role. Another surprise appearance was Mike Myers, who popped up as the British General and added a little more classic Tarantino humour to the movie.

As a quick note to previous Tarantino viewers looking out for the roles of Samuel L. Jackson and Tarantino himself in this film, they both make an appearance of sorts. Samuel L Jackson provides the voice narrating the film, and although there is very little narration, it is unmistakably him. We see Tarantino's hands in Inglorious Basterds, around the throat of Diane Kruger, because apparently, he wanted to make the strangulation as realistic as possible. A little bit weird if you ask me...

If you like the movies of Quentin Tarantino then Inglorious Basterds is definitely a film that you should be watching. If you’re interested in the Second World War then you should watch it, but don’t be expecting a ‘true story’ film. It’s a funny, bloody and brilliant film which isn't as complex as his other movies, but is every little bit as enjoyable.

Django Unchained

There was quite a lot of anticipation for the latest film from Quentin Tarantino. With some already excellent films behind him, Django Unchained was always going to be successful. However, its released was surrounded by a number of articles damning Tarantino for his comic use of violence and how he doesn't take serious issues such as slavery or the Holocaust seriously. I find that the best solution to this is as follows. If you don’t like the look of a film, don’t go and watch it. If you think it’s too violent, don’t go and watch it. If you think you might get offended because the film has slaves or Nazis in it, don’t go and watch it. It’s simple really.

The plot of Django Unchained is very enjoyable, and there’s no doubt that it’s an edge of your seat thriller, if you like Tarantino’s movies. However, there are some very similar plot lines to in his other movies, such as Kill Bill or Inglorious Basterds, where there’s a main character who has a grudge to settle and kills a lot of people in settling that grudge. A man is freed from slavery, joins with a bounty hunter, kills people, and then tries to free his wife from slavery. The difference with Django is that it happens in a completely different setting. Imagine a Western which Tarantino would walk into and stamp his mark all over. Despite parallels to other films, Django Unchained is a different film, and it is a very good way to spend a couple of hours.

Having seen Jamie Foxx in ‘Ray’ and absolutely loving him, I was very interested to see how he would do in a Tarantino movie. He is very good, and has a very sinister air to his character. When the audience can almost ‘feel’ the character getting angry, and is anxiously waiting to see what happens, you can tell that the actor is doing something right. He delivers some of Tarantino’s one-liners perfectly. However, I did find the development of his character a little bit unrealistic. However, I then realised that it was Tarantino, the guy who can have a girl shot from one direction and have her fly off in a completely different direction. I found myself (unsurprisingly) rooting for Foxx, and overall liked the character he played.

I loved Christoph Waltz in Inglorious Basterds, and in Django Unchained he was every little bit as wonderful. His character, the bounty hunter, was quick-tongue, witty, sly, and determined. The scene where Django finally sees his wife again and she faints in shock is absolutely made by Waltz’s delivery of his punchline. I thought his character was very interesting too. The scene where he is making the deal with Candie just shows how principled his character is. I’m not sure he deserves his Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor though. Either way I don’t think he’ll win it, and I’m not trying to deny that he was fantastic in this film. It’s almost worth going to see just for him, which is saying something.

Leonardo di Caprio is one of my all-time favourites. Not because I think he’s an amazing actor, but because I just enjoy his films and his characters. He shows incredible versatility, and Django Unchained is no exception. As the wealthy Francophile owner of a vast number of slaves, he is very confident and arrogant. He hates to be made a fool of and seems to be very different to the historical view of slave owners, treating many of his slaves as his friends. However, there are some scenes which are just grim. He doesn’t bat an eyelid at one man being torn apart by dogs, and is more than happy to let two men fight to the death to see who is the better fighter. His acting is fantastic, but his character is better, and once again I found myself enjoying the time he spent on screen. He’s definitely one of Tarantino’s more interesting characters, and parallels can be drawn to Hans Landa in the way that he doesn’t show the typical historical attitude to the people Tarantino poses his character against.

Can anyone say a bad word about Samuel L Jackson? He is once again, absolutely incredible in Django Unchained, and the audience is left a little bit unsure as to what his role is in Candie’s life. He raised him, and also runs his house, but Candie seems to respect his opinion over and above many of the white men he employs. Jackson is as funny as Waltz in this film, and his sheer shock at seeing Django on a horse (and the following exchange between him and Candie) had me in stitches. However, his character is much more serious than that, and represents a major influence in the life of a white man, which at the time would have been largely unthinkable.  I largely agree with this article (http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/01/08/samuel_l_jackson_in_django_unchained_deserves_an_oscar_as_stephen_quentin.html) which promotes Jackson for the Supporting Actor nomination over Waltz, purely because he shows off his acting skills to the fullest in Django.

In terms of other Tarantino films, Django will never be considered as one of the best. That title will always, in my eyes, go to Pulp Fiction, with Reservoir Dogs a close second. I also don’t think it is as good as Inglorious Basterds, but I think it could give Kill Bill a decent run for its money. Having not yet seen Jackie Brown, I can’t comment on this, but Django Unchained will definitely be considered a classic Tarantino movie, and it’s definitely worth a watch. If you liked his other movies you will like Django, but if you don’t like violence, comic or otherwise, I’d steer clear.