| V'07 : pt5 : Diary of the Dead; No Country For Old Men; Shotgun Stories; etc |
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| Monday, 19 November 2007 | |
 GEORGE A ROMERO'S DIARY OF THE DEAD [6/10] Fine film though it was, Romero's Land of the Dead (2005) was generally regarded as a financial flop: hence the director's return to lower-budget film-making for the latest of his trademark combinations of gore, dark comedy and media/political satire. Here he takes a Blair Witch-ish, "found" footage approach to the modern zombie genre (which Romero, it should by now be needless to repeat, himself created), mixing in some rather old-hat Scream-style post-modernism/self-referentiality for good measure. Results are frustratingly uneven, especially as Romero is clearly still capable of hitting the bullseye when he really puts his mind to it: opening scene (a zombie attack caught by TV news-cameras) is terrific; last shot is astonishing and unexpectedly resonant and moving; but what comes between shows distinctly variable levels of inspiration and wit (even if the stomach-churning set-pieces nimbly transcend any budgetary limitations). Romero is essentially treading water here, making his points about the ills of modern society and culture in a much more overt and heavy-handed manner than last time out. LA FRANCE [6/10] review contains major spoiler, so has been placed at the foot of the page. you have been warned!!! scroll right down to read it NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN [6/10] The Coens' first official collaboration as directors, their crazily audacious and inventive remake of The Ladykillers, was cruelly underappreciated on its 2004 release (all of the pair's previous films were formally credited to Joel C. as director and Ethan C. as producer). Now the critics have been going a bundle over this inferior follow-up, which adapts Cormac McCarthy's surprise bestseller - a tale of stolen money, ruthless criminals, and a psychopathic hitman set in 1980 Texas - but can't overcome the book's fundamental structural inadequacies. Early and middle sections strike a bold and largely successful mix of dark comedy and existential drama, but the final act sees plot and mood unravel with the exit (perversely, offscreen) of its main protagonist, an opportunistic semi-redneck played by Josh Brolin. Something of a leading-man manque for a decade or so, Brolin is overdue such a meaty role and he rises to the challenge. He's overshadowed, however, by an outstandingly sinister/odd/amusing turn from Javier Bardem (as the psychopathic hitman) just a shame the picture has no idea how to end his character's story. On balance, not a bad movie as such - but nor is it any valid heir to Blood Simple, the Coens' first film and a much more successful example of 80s Texas noir. It certainly doesn't help that, as the end credits reveal, SHOTGUN STORIES [6/10] Promising debut from writer-director Nichols: a slow-burning, atmospherically shot and scored tale of a fractured, feuding family in a dustily rural, unassumingly-idyllic Arkansas. Mood and tone (now wryly comic, now unsettlingly ominous) are established and nicely maintained through the early and middle sections - a "shitstorm" is, we realise, gradually brewing towards violent foment - Nichols sensibly placing most of the narrative burden on the imposingly square shoulders of his staringly-intense leading man Michael Shannon (a rare but welcome spell in the limelight for an enormously talented performer more usually found in Hollywood supporting roles). As the feud between estranged kinsmen escalates, however, a certain tipping-point of credibility is reached and exceeded - from there on in, the characters' motivations seem more a matter of scriptwriting contrivance than organic believability, although things (thankfully) don't spiral into the kind of bloody melodrama we're led at certain stages to expect. On the downside, one or two of the dramatis personae seem to have wandered in from another film entirely (specifically, the kind of jokey-quirky rural-indie ensembler of which Todd Rohal's The Guatemalan Handshake is the most archetypal recent example). And we're a long way from the three-brother-tragedy of Rowan Woods' indelible Antipodean entry from 1998, The Boys. At its best, however, Shotgun Stories has some of the doomy intensity of, say, At Close Range (1986): this is clearly a filmmaker who knows how to evoke place and, more crucially, how to dramatise the way environment affects (dictates?) (masculine) action. Neil Young 18th November, 2007  George A Romero's Diary of the Dead : [6/10] : aka Diary of the Dead : George A. ROMERO : US 2007 : 97m : seen 29th Oct, Stadtkino La France : [6/10] : Serge BOZON : France 2007 : 102m : seen 29th Oct, Gartenbaukino No Country For Old Men : [6/10] : Ethan COEN & Joel COEN : USA 2007 : 122m : seen 27th Oct, Gartenbaukino Shotgun Stories : [6/10] : Jeff NICHOLS : USA 2007 : 90m : seen 26th Oct, Kunstlerhaus (all : complimentary press-delegate tickets) JIGSAW LOUNGE : VIENNALE 2007 : INDEX PAGE La France A disarmingly fresh, if ultimately not entirely successful take on WW1 themes: a rather lukewarm and hand-me-down plot (a gamine, spirited young woman who poses as a boy so she can head to the front line in search of her M.I.A lover) is given an audacious twist by having the characters perform four anachronistic musical-numbers (which have a breezy, sixtiesish folkiness) at various key junctures. These slightly-dreamlike moments (each of the songs bears the name of a country participating the war; the film itself is therefore clearly intended as the fifth "song") punctuate an otherwise dourly-realistic narrative. The overall feel is a little bit like a cross between A Very Long Engagement and Moulin Rouge!, perhaps, though much more subdued and wistful than either, taking its tone from the steely cobalts of the characters' (distractingly spotless) uniforms. Director clearly has talent, but misses a major trick by not making more use of Cecile Reigher, who plays the protagonist's sister: a dotty, bespectacled dead ringer for Isabelle Adjani in L'Histoire d'Adele H, she's by some way the liveliest thing about the picture, but is restricted to just a single scene right at the start. She nevertheless makes much more impact than the eleventh-hour cameo from 'marquee name' Guillaume Depardieu as the bland object of our heroine's surging amour fou. |
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