| Tribune this week : 'The International' [6/10], 'The Class' [7/10]; 'Franklyn' [3/10] |
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 The International USA/UK/Germany 2009 Starring : Clive Owen, Naomi Watts Director : Tom Tykwer ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Class France 2008 Starring : Francois Begaudeau, Franck Keita Director : Laurent Cantet ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Franklyn UK/France 2008 Starring : Eva Green, Sam Riley Director : Gerald McMorrow ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ SLICK suspense-thriller The International proved a controversial opener for this month's Berlin Film Festival. Not because of content - in the current economic climate, the idea that large swathes of the world's banking system are shadily malevolent is unlikely to find many naysayers. Rather, it was felt that the movie was, despite its dark tone - this is essentially a paranoid cold-war-type thriller updated to the polonium era - too mainstream an entertainment to launch such a prestigious cultural event. Such snobbery handily ignores the fact that the 'Berlinale' (check out Tribune in a fortnight for a complete report on the latest renewal) has, since its inception, always been a Hollywood-influenced and Hollywood-friendly affair. And The International is certainly more intelligent and imaginative than the majority of current multiplex fare. Nowhere near as smart as its own ad-campaign, however: the poster, featuring the bold, distinctive, black-and-white curved spaces inside New York's Guggenheim museum - scene of a six-minute shoot-out which, even its detractors admit, hits the target - is recognisable a mile off. Anyone using a cashpoint in the city, meanwhile, finds themselves greeted with a brief trailer for the movie and a sinister message along the lines of "we control your money - we control your life!" The "we" in question here is the 'International' of the title: the Luxembourg-based IBBC, an entirely fictional institution which just happens to very closely resemble the Luxembourg-based BCCI of early-90s infamy. Both organisations use banking as a front for money-laundering, arms-trafficiking, smuggling and various other nefarious activities - and in The International we follow crusading Interpol agent Louis Salinger (Owen) in his quest to bring the evildoers to justice. The ensuing shenanigans owe much to recent outings in the Jason Bourne and James Bond franchises - it's presumably a coincidence that the plot is essentially a cross between Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. Owen has, of course, often been linked with the Bond role, though his grizzled dourness, which is much on display here, doesn't fit the suave 007 stereotype. That said, his hangdog, stolid charisma - last showcased in the superior Children of Men - is a key element in keeping The International going though some clunky dialogue and plausibility-stretching developments. Even more troubling is the not-so-subtle subtext, that "international" crooks like IBBC now demand "international" police-forces, preferably armed and pro-active, rather than the ineffectual quasi-plods of Interpol et al. AS it turned out, The International was by no means the most critically-reviled movie of the Berlinale - much vitriol would be poured on what was widely regarded as a sub-standard festival, especially the competition section. Berlin remains one of Europe's "big three" alongside Venice and Cannes, but surprise Golden Bear winner The Milk of Sorrow is pretty small beer in comparison to those events' main winners - Darren Aronofsky's masterpiece The Wrestler, which took home the Golden Lion on the Lido last September, and Laurent Cantet's classroom drama The Class (Entre les murs), reportedly the "unanimous" jury-choice for Cannes' Palme d'Or earlier in the year. Though the picture itself is disarmingly direct and straightforward, its genesis is a little complicated. Francois Begaudeau is a novelist and sometime film-critic, who spent time in the early part of the decade teaching in an inner-city Paris school. He fictionalised his experiences into the 2006 book which he, director Laurent Cantet and Cantet's frequent collaborator Robin Campillo (who also serves - and shines - as film-editor) then adapted into a screenplay. Screen-debutant Begaudeau is Francois Marin, a genial, wiry thirtysomething who sees himself as the kids' friend and confidant as much as their teacher. He's idealistic but sensible, and his mildly unconventional methods seem to work OK with his multi-ethnic tutor-group. The early stretches of the film have a nicely loose, easygoing, semi-documentary feel, though we sense aspects of dramatic narrative slowly cohering around the most hot-headed of Francois' students, Mali-born Souleymane (Franck Keita.) What follows is engrossing, informative and stimulating, as we observe various aspects of the school disciplinary process in close detail, Cantet and his collaborators making some quiet but revealing points about 21st-century France along the way. In the end, however, it's debatable whether The Class fully justifies its 130-minute running time - check out the priceless Comic Relief sketch (see YouTube) involving David Tennant and Catherine Tate, which covered similar terrain in a fraction of the time and with considerably more wit. There's much to like about Cantet's picture, and it's a startling return to form after 2005's sex-tourism misfire Heading South. The Palme d'Or, however, seems excessive reward - especially since the opposition included James Gray's superb Two Lovers, which is released here at the end of March. HAVING expounded at such length on The International and The Class, I find that I must be much more brief and cursory with another of this week's releases, mind-bendingly ambitious Anglo-French co-production Franklyn. But this isn't really a movie that deserves much in the way of column-inches: undemanding teenagers with posters of Dark City, The Matrix, V For Vendetta and the upcoming Watchmen on their walls may conceivably lap it up, but even they will probably realise that this kind of thing has been done so much better so many times before. What's especially disappointing is that such a high-calibre cast - including Sam Riley, in his first acting role since 2007's phenomenal debut Control - has somehow become attached to such a mess of a script. Making an awkward transition from pop-videos and adverts, writer-director Gerald McMorrow seems to have chucked in every idea he's had over the past decade, then cobbled them together into a screenplay that one suspects makes sense only to McMorrow himself. In modern-day London, we observe a sad-eyed loner (Riley), a suicidal performance-artist (Eva Green) and a distraught dad (Bernard Hill) go about their business. These sequences are interspersed with a parallel, seemingly unconnected narrative set in an alternative reality: the baroque, over-populated, religion-dominated 'Meanwhile City', where a masked vigilante (Ryan Philippe) stalks a villain known as The Individual. How, we speculate, will the two strands come together? After about an hour, it becomes apparent that no satisfying resolution to Franklyn's "puzzle" is possible - and, worse, neither do we much care about the characters or whatever connections they may have. In the end, all we're left with is the strikingly imaginative creation that is Meanwhile City - Laurence Dorman is credited as Production Designer - and an unshakeable whiff of derivative, pretentious self-indulgence. Neil Young 17th February, 2009  THE INTERNATIONAL : [6/10] : USA/Ger/UK 2009 : Tom TYKWER : 118m (BBFC) : seen 5th February 2009, CinemaxX cinema, Berlin (press show - Berlin Film Festival) - original review - full Berlinale coverage THE CLASS : [7/10] : Entre les murs : France 2008 : Laurent CANTET : 130m (BBFC) : seen 23th January 2009, CineWorld cinema, Milton Keynes (press show - 60th CinemaDays event) FRANKLYN : [3/10] : UK (UK/Fr) 2008 : Gerald McMORROW : 98m (BBFC) : seen 23th January 2009, CineWorld cinema, Milton Keynes (press show - 60th CinemaDays event)
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