Review of 2013

Well, as the year ends here comes the obligatory blog about the year's best that many of you will only glance at, bemoaning the absence of one film or my over exuberant praise of a title you found maudlin. First off then:

2013 WAS A DREADFUL YEAR FOR MOVIES

It absolutely was. There was virtually nothing this year that was great or worthy of purchase for the home theatre shelves (we all have those, right?). As filmmakers like Steven Spielberg talk about movie-going becoming a real novelty rather than art for the masses, the writing on the wall becomes ever more legible. Few films truly grip, studios try to meet the demands of every single demographic group resulting in everything lacking surprise or flair. Even those 'message movies' that the Oscars love were largely dull and irrelevant. I cannot recall any of them. The few interesting films there were were exactly that, interesting. Hardly, the stuff of praise to describe a film as interesting. Even the auteur pieces often felt too experimental or unchallenged by the editor's knife.

Therefore, my list will include interesting titles worth inspection but hardly essential. Although there were at least four films this year that were great and worthy of your money. We'll save them for the end.

WORTH A WATCH BUT HARDLY ESSENTIAL

MAN OF STEEL

I will defend this film more than most. Yes, it is an hour too long and has a complete disregard for human life (the innocent bystander body count hits genocidal figures), but there was something about this Superman iteration that felt relevant, which every iteration before didn't. Henry Cavill admirably fills the suit and the film acknowledges the fearful reaction the world would have to Kal-El. Kevin Costner's scant time on-screen alone gives the film a heart and soul. Hans Zimmer's score rocks too.

THE KINGS OF SUMMER

Coming of age tales about boys are fairly common these days. The beats are often too well trod to merit the nostalgia they aim for. What stands Kings of Summer out from the films before it is a wonderful sense of humour that manages to sit perfectly beside the more serious ideas. Add to that a cast that can handle either at the turn of a phrase. Nick Offerman gets special praise for finally nabbing a role proving there is more to him than the bitter buddha of his Parks and Recreation character, Ron Swanson.

MUD

Another coming-of-age tale, this time with an interesting criminal story in the background. The Mississippi setting has a threatening edge to it, and the characters are very well drawn given they all play second fiddle to child actors, Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland. Matthew McConaughey continues his brilliant run of mature roles and more time devoted to his character would have been nice, rather than spending it with the boys. The third act evolves into the Peckinpah movie it has been threatening to be throughout, and it is a welcome change from the sedate pace that precedes it.

THE WORLD'S END

The Cornetto Trilogy concludes with the first inessential instalment. It lacks the laughs of its former films, and the ending feels like a cop-out but there is a lot to admire still. The central characters have Pegg and Frost playing refreshingly against type, and the central idea of the staling of friendship is a powerful one. Add in the best fight sequence of the year, and you have a pleasant watch. Just not the film you wanted to see.

THE LAST STAND

*GUILTY PLEASURE KLAXON* Seeing Schwarzenegger back on screen was an unexpected delight. The film is utter tosh and defies logic, physics, legal precedent and political correctness, but in an age of rather vanilla action it was a welcome palette cleanse, if one you instantly forgot after you finished watching.

FAST AND FURIOUS 6

It seems very odd to write, in the wake of recent news, the fun that is to be had watching this carmageddon, but that is exactly the film on screen and to describe it as anything else is perjury. This film is bonkers. The dialogue is awful, the plot is non-existent but when I tell you I laughed the hardest all year when Vin Diesel executes a flying head butt, you should be sold.

DJANGO UNCHAINED

When was the last time Quentin Tarantino heard the word no? This three hour Western is packed with originality and some exceptional characters (take a bow Messers DiCaprio and Jackson) but is crippled by the director's need to have everyone talk. Westerns are not about talking; they're about silence and action. Sometimes the dialogue works but often it slows the whole thing down. If he had taken an hour out of it, and maybe had the gall to give us the ending that the film threatened (a real downbeat ending where racial prejudice wins out seemed to be on the cards), it might have been a real return to QT's glory days.

ALAN PARTRIDGE: ALPHA PAPA

Fans of the Coogan character border on zealotry, such is their love for Alan; but was the film perfect? No. For such a short film it still dragged and often went into territory the TV show would never have allowed itself to venture. That said, the final ten minutes will have you in tears from laughing.

OBLIVION

Derivative of just about every film that came before, Oblivion was really not very original with its narrative. Visually though, it was exceptional. The scorched earthen landscapes were things of utter beauty and Joseph Kosinski (after his under-rated debut Tron: Legacy) is proving to be a wonderful visual storyteller, who takes his time setting up everything without an urge to blow something up. Also, the closing song is brilliant.

WORTH YOUR TIME AND MONEY

GRAVITY

Neither the saviour of cinema or a perfect, flawless piece of work. What we have is a one-off; a beautiful and thrilling ride that operates entirely within the confines of the cinema screen and through the glare of 3D glasses. Alfonso Cuaron has made a film that is absolutely meant to be seen in the darkened auditoriums of a multiplex, and it is a brilliant visceral piece of filmmaking that will have you gasping for air. But on home video; the experience will be lost. See it in a cinema and experience it. Because otherwise you will spend your time wondering what all the fuss was about.

THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES

Greek tragedy done on a small-town scale. This is a film about characters, their actions and the repercussions. Ryan Gosling plays the deadbeat who starts stealing to provide for a son he barely knows, while Bradley Cooper evolves from earnest hero to careerist schemer. It is about twenty minutes too long, arguably Gosling's arc is the least essential, but the structure is so different from what we are accustomed to that the film just about manages to hold our attention despite the lag. This film has a devastating emotional power that leaves you thinking about what you saw long after the credits roll.

IRON MAN 3

Who would have thought the comic book movie could really surprise us a decade on? Under the directorial eye of 80s enfant terrible Shane Black, Marvel didn't just repeat the formula they had finally gotten right with last years Avengers. Black threw out the rule book and made a movie he wanted to see. Showing little regard for fan expectation or what had preceded it, he carved out a niche movie that barely resembles a comic book movie. The third act twist was brilliant and Robert Downey Jnr became the Sean Connery of Iron Man - irreplaceable. Like the director and film itself, he is funny, irreverent, but full of heart when required. It was a real surprise and the only blockbuster this year that tried to do something different whilst remaining loyal to the spirit of what had come before.

THE ONLY, REALLY GREAT FILM THIS YEAR

CAPTAIN PHILLIPS

Often a director too concerned with message or style, Paul Greengrass made his most humane film to date, resulting in the strongest film of his career. Tom Hanks is the story's beating, all-too-human heart, opposite Somali newcomer Barkhad Abdi, chilling with his ice cold practicality. 

After an opening scene that sets up the world Phillips has to lose, the tension never lets up. The terms "nail biting" and "edge of your seat" are overused hyperbole, but in this instance they are absolutely appropriate. Be it the opening siege or the later claustrophobic negotiations that make up the second half Greengrass' film is never short of tension. 

Much has been made of Hanks' final scene in the film, as the weight and reality of his character's ordeal finally hits home. It is the actor's finest work to date, but also represents the trauma the audience has just endured along with him. The film is brutal, uncompromising and the only one that I cannot stop talking about this year.

The Sweet Forever

George Pelecanos is not a name I imagine any of you are familiar with. If you are it is likely you have seen his TV work, he was a writer and producer for shows such as The Pacific, Treme and, the holy grail itself, The Wire. Yet his background is as a novelist, specialising in crime stories set in his hometown Washington DC. Within that community he is considered one of the true living greats of the genre and ranks alongside better known names like James Ellroy and Dennis Lehane.

The Sweet Forever is the third in his DC Quartet series, following The Big Blowdown and King Suckerman. The story concerns itself with a car accident on a DC street, and the people who witness the crash. Given this is a crime novel, there's a bit more to it than that. The driver was a money runner for the local kingpin and, in the pandaemonium that follows, a bystander nabs the runner's money and hightails it out of there. A victimless crime, but even the simplest of actions can cause a butterfly effect; street justice takes over the neighbourhood and innocent bystanders are caught up in the maelstrom. It is a slow burn of a story but one where incident is all the more felt. Acts of violence have true impact and never feel gratuitous.

This was reportedly the book that got Pelecanos the job The Wire and it is easy to see why. The Sweet Forever's backdrop is set against the drug epidemic that flooded DCs inner city, and the different sectors of society it affects - street kids, small business owners, the police. This novel is one less concerned with a thrill ride than it is with documenting a place and time. The narrative is secondary to documenting the effect cocaine has had on the city's inhabitants, physical or otherwise.

What really makes this novel stand out though is its dialogue. Pelecanos captures the language of the street without it ever seeming contrite or an act, it feels authentic. Few writers really can capture different social classes through dialogue the way he has and the fact that this book hasn't garnered more attention for its authenticity is something of a crime itself. Start today. It is a devastating book and a terrific read.

Orphan Black

To discuss this show's plot in any real detail is to spoil the many twists, turns and brilliant tonal shifts this show has for you. In short though, a con artist called Sarah Manning is waiting on a platform for her connecting train, destitute and down on her luck. She spies a woman about to throw herself in front of a train. Preparing to intervene, the woman turns and reveals herself to be identical to Sarah herself in every way, and then jumps. Given her huckster nature, Sarah steals the dead woman's identity only to fall into an enormous conspiracy. I will say no more than that. I hope that is enough to entice you because Orphan Black is one of the real surprises this year.

It feels like a collaboration between Joss Whedon and the warped grunge aesthetics of David Fincher. The creators, Graeme Manson and John Fawcett, craft instantly memorable characters the way Whedon does best. Their creations are far more disturbed and unlikeable for the most part than the Whedonverse though. They also share the ability to have gay characters who are not defined by their sexuality in the way that many lesser shows do. The look and feel of the show though is pure Fincher. The unnamed city feels like the unnamed city of Se7en and the score is reminiscent of Trent Reznor's work for Fincher. Everything is slighly off-kilter in this world, even the music.

Its pilot may feel a little bit like in-flight entertainment at first but in its first ten episodes alone there are nods to police procedurals, suburban satire, conspiracy thrillers and black comedy without ever losing sight of its overarching narrative. It is virtually a different show from episode to episode. It scores extra points too for presenting mysteries to us and solving them quickly, rather than teasing answers out over years.

There are problems. Characters run out of steam but hang around aimlessly and others are so one-note that they grow irritating fast. Jordan Gavaris, in particular, plays what can only be described as the equivalent of gay blackface.

The real treasure is lead actress Tatiana Maslany. She gives one of the most versatile performances I have ever seen from a performer. She imbues her characters (the dead girl and Sarah) with tiny tics and quirks that make them wholly different personalities. You forget that a single actress is playing these roles and for that she deserves all the credit in the world. If Orphan Black's story is great, then Maslany is revelatory.

Currently airing on BBC Three, catch up now and be ahead of everyone else who'll be on the band wagon when season two airs next year.

Captain Phillips

Paul Greengrass has been absent from screens since his last directorial effort, Green Zone. Known for searing political thrillers Tom Hanks is not necessarily the actor you think of when paired with Greengrass. The heavy nature of the director's work tends to have an equally 'serious' actor at the forefront of it. Hanks has an innately likeable everyman quality to him but you wouldn't buy him as one of Greengrass' CIA spooks. His very casting transforms Captain Phillips into the director's best work.

Based on the true story of a commercial ship hijacked by Somali prates in 2010, the men at the center of this story are not soldiers. They are essentially mechanics. They can't fight and don't know how to. Early attempts to defend their vessel are clumsy and awkward when contrasted against the ruthless professionalism of the invading pirates. Notably when defending their ship they only have hoses and flares at their disposal. The sheer odds stacked against these sailors is unbelievable. Their opponents have nothing to lose. These action sequences are edited in harmony with the shredded nerves of the characters and audience.

Without giving anything away the drama becomes far more intimate later and here Greengrass' beloved handheld cameras heighten the claustrophobia and tension on screen. Unlike Bourne the technique does not dizzy or confuse us, we are right there with these people.  Characters are squeezed together and every passing moment feels more fraught and hopeless. Composer Henry Jackman's pounding score keeps your blood pressure up throughout even the quietest moments of this crisis. You are never given pause.

Hanks is the secret weapon though. He is playing another of his trademark every-men but one tested to the very limits of human endurance. The character's vulnerability and humanity always evident, his final scene is without exception his best work. The final twenty minutes really set Phillips out from the actor's other roles. The emotional toll this experience takes on Phillips is unbelievably portrayed to the point it will almost certainly leave you a little traumatised. Hanks provides a humanity many of Greengrass' other films have sorely lacked. It is his emotion that keeps us hooked and praying for a happy outcome, no matter how unlikely that may be or how well presented the story is.

So far in 2013 this is the clear standout and film of the year for me. Less showy than a lot Oscar fare coming up will be but you are unlikely to have a film hit you harder by the time the credits roll.

Dexter Season 1

"Oh! You have to watch Dexter. It's so good!"

That tends to be the general consensus from people when I ask if there's a show that is essential viewing. Everyone talks about how Season 4 is amazing and it is really dark and shocking with great twists. Starting from the beginning though the show has no signs of the shocks or intelligence its fans praise it for. Ironically, after just having started watching Dexter the series concluded and was widely derided as having one of the worst endings to a TV show in history. Based on the first season I saw I am inclined to agree (almost).

Drowning in meta-ironic-oh-so-clever voiceover from Dexter himself (Michael C. Hall) the show comments on every scene as it plays out. What this does may well present us with insight into Dexter Morgan's calculating killer mind but what it fails to do is present us with any real story or character development. All the other characters seem rather flat and one-note - his sister whines and curses, the captain is careerist and the best detective is aggressive. The voiceover just commented on everything as if that is an appropriate substitute for drama. I was honestly hating the entire experience. The ice truck killer mystery (the arc of this first season) was very dully presented and the voiceover, trying to entice us in, bored me with every comment made on proceedings.

And then something happened. In the eighth episode, the voiceover dissipates and Michael C. Hall is presented with an opportunity to act, and he does, brilliantly. Taking into account Dexter is a serial killer who to mask all his urges from everyone around him he is put in the house of his newly deceased 'birth' father (Morgan was adopted at three) and his curiosity at what might make him the way he is puts him into conflict with the family around him. Hall portrays that conflict brilliantly, all nervous ticks and enthusiasm. The show from then on starts to tell stories with the characters and becomes more engaging.

The final three episodes transform too, becoming fraught and intense. Given how much the show delivers its twists in such nonchalant fashion, season one's final episode has real surprise and impact to it. The dramatic changes in how it tells its story do not make up for the disappointment of earlier episodes but it does leave you with some satisfaction and curiosity for giving Season 2 a go. Whether it's worthy of being called a great drama though still requires a lot more work on the part of the show itself.

Gangster Squad

When this film was first announced way back when, there was a fair amount of buzz that this film would be true oscar contender. Yet following the Colorado tragedy in August 2012, Gangster Squad found itself pushed back to January (the graveyard slot in US cinema calendars) and suffered extensive reshoots. The reviews when it was finally released were less than so-so. Yet watching free of the storm, Gangster Squad is confident fun, if entirely unexceptional.

It is about as historically accurate as U-571 and not a single female character is provided anything resembling an identity, but fortunately neither are the men. Ryan Gosling has a high-pitched voice. Josh Brolin is dedicated to justice. The rest of the team are there to virtually tick every box required for an action film team (old timer, family man, hard case black guy, Michael Peña). All play their roles exactly as they should be, as caricatures. Its tone flails wildly between hardened crime odyssey and silly cartoon fun. But that is to miss the point.

This film exists to purely entertain and it does. It is a cops vs. robbers movie, and is boldly presented that way. Visually, it dazzles. Shot on digital, everyone and everything in it looks stunning. Costumes and sets are truly works of art at times. Suits are sharp, dresses seduce and sets sparkle. Unlike Public Enemies, the digital style never distracts or irritates. You get to really take in the recreated 1940s Los Angeles, before it is shot up. Emma Stone and Gosling flirting back and forth at a bar is arguably the most aesthetic sequence ever committed to film. They shine as do their surroundings. The action, as well, is competent and old fashioned. No shaky cameras here. Every shot is well orchestrated and composed.

There are some really nice touches. Minor characters are not dispatched in blink-and-its-over moments we are accustomed to, and it is truly refreshing. In movies of this type, smaller characters (despite veterans of law enforcement and organised crime) never seem to have any grit to them. Here, when cornered, they fight back, and properly. That alone raises it above most others. It isn't really enough to recommend the film but makes for an interesting footnote.

The true criticism of the film is not how by-the-numbers it all is (by minute three, you know the next two hours perfectly). It is the way the production chose to rewrite American social politics. It ignores the overwhelming racism and segregation raging at the time within the country which is just plain offensive. It merely choses to forget it, like we will with the film about an hour after watching.

One of those films you will say is good when you hear its name. But no-one will remember Gangster Squad in the first place.

High and Low

Akira Kurosawa is usually remembered as a director of stately yet thrilling historical samurai pictures such as Seven Samurai and Yojimbo. In 1963 though, he adapted a pulp novel from American crime writer Ed McBain about cops and kidnappers. This was his version of those pictures and it is clear when watching that this is a director interpreting a genre as he sees fit and not adhering to the filmmaking rules that come with material like this.

The plot itself is relatively straightforward. A successful businessman, Kingo Gondo (Toshiro Mifune), on the eve of a pivotal moment in his career, becomes a victim of extortion when his chauffeur's son is kidnapped and held to ransom. The opening act is Kingo negotiating with the kidnapper over the phone, assisted by the police. The problem is that the ransom essentially destroys his career and his family's future in the process. The central conceit of the opening act is a fascinating one. Would you do the right thing to save a life if it meant destroying your own? Gondo too is not some personification of selfish industrialism. He is torn between two families, his own and his chauffeur's. It poses a lot of food for thought when our prominent businessman is not a monster. Without giving away what happens the second half of the film is the police investigation and search for the kidnappers.

Kurosawa shoots the first act in stationary wide shots and long takes. You rarely leave Gondo's living room in the early stretch. The first act could honestly work as a one act play, and it has that visual quality to it. It makes for uncomfortable watching as you are left to ponder in realtime over Gondo's dilemma as he does. The problem is that these takes grow tiresome and rather boring. You are left with forty minutes of almost tableaux. It might be artful and have something to say, but it does not make for entertaining viewing.

It is in the second, more traditional act that the film picks up pace. A train sequence is truly gripping as police try to identify the kidnapper without having the first clue what they look like. The camerawork is handheld (hardly Bourne but you get the gist) and you are crammed into tight corridors. It is a tense set-piece that serves as the film's highlight, made all the more gripping viewing it as a contemporary audience knowing that 'secret cameras' are the size of speakers and the police are trying to hide them. It also presents us with the inner workings of a police investigation - how one man can be located inside a city as sprawling as Tokyo seems like a daunting task - but the breadcrumbs are laid out neatly and it is impressive how believable and satisfying the process is to watch.

It is a far more intimate piece of work than Kurosawa's samurai films and it is nowhere near as essential  but High and Low has enough to grip you and leave you thinking long after it finishes.

Broadchurch

This blog of mine is starting to have a recurring trend to it. I am showering praise on miniseries not from the US, that appear to revolve around the same premise. Small towns and their inhabitants being tested by the actions of a child. Top of the Lake took beautiful New Zealand scenery and used the disappearance of a girl to reveal all its occupants were virtually all evil or tolerant of it. Broadchurch does similar with the murder of a twelve year old boy but with more heart.

Broadchurch shares its DNA more with Scandanavian series like The Killing or The Bridge than the Kiwi show. It truly takes the time to focus on the bereaved family (usually reduced to a few scenes of crying and screaming, but here each member is truly examined), the lynch mob mentality of the community and the short-memory of the press, and how they all affect one another. One of the big strengths of the show is its ability for audience empathy. This show taps into the grieving process as well as our emotional response to these events. Every suspect in or out of the confession room has us thinking one thing of them and yet in mere minutes our sympathies will turn, forever certain, and then changed again.

The central thrust of the story is with the investigation and its easily recognisable mismatched cops. Olivia Colman is the local copper with a heart of gold and genuine warmth to all. We first see her returning from holiday and showering colleagues with trinket gifts, then swearing at losing her promotion. She is every bit the copper but her warmth and community spirit compromise her with every suspect coming through. David Tennant plays the more clichéd role. A big city cop haunted by previous cases and demons. Hardened to the world and its sinners, Tennant never plays him for sympathy but leaves us with something worth caring for - his conviction. It is his best work post-Who and the role that should evaporate your association of him with the Doctor. Both of the leads will no doubt gain BAFTA nods (Colman is talked about as if she has already won) but David Bradley, Jodie Whitaker and Andrew Buchan are all equally deserving.

The true hero though is creator, Chris Chibnall. The man constructed a narrative filled with red herrings but never any sense that they are deliberately there to irritate. This show is as much concerned about revealing a beach town can be as vile as any urban city as it is with giving you a true answer to the killer's identity. The jolly facade of everyone in the premier episode's tracking shot is gone come the final episode's cold reveal. Without giving anything away this is Chibnall's greatest achievement. British dramas always rush their denouements through with hearty cheers and loose ends. In Broadchurch, he has made the reveal as devastating to his community as the initial murder. The destruction this killer has left in their wake will not disappear. It never will. It is in this, its final episode that Broadchurch goes from great to exceptional programming.

Top of the Lake

It's unlikely that you've ever heard much about New Zealand TV series that are must-watches. Top of the Lake is likely the first one.

Created by Jane Campion (she of The Piano fame) and Gerard Lee, with Campion sharing directing duties with Garth Davis, Top of the Lake takes the rather familiar trope of the police procedural and uses it as the prism through which we examine a small Kiwi community and the various characters that inhabit it.

Tui, a local girl, goes missing shortly after a suicide attempt wherein she tried to drown herself in the lake of the title. She is the daughter of Matt (Peter Mullan), the local kingpin who keeps the town safe and largely employed in his empire by one means or another.  Sydney cop Robin Givens (Mad Men's Elizabeth Moss), over visiting her dying mother, is sequestered for Tui's initial interview and subsequent search party. What follows would give away what surfaces over the six hour running time but needless to say every character in an always expanding ensemble has a horrifying secret that comes out, including Robin. Adultery, rape, corruption, bribery, pedophilia and murder all feature against a backdrop of sexism and apathy. Dealing out town justice leaves further reaching scars than ever originally intended.

Campion's name is normally associated with far more art-house fare. Her work often basted in pretentiousness and dull restraint, and while Top of the Lake has the same ponderous scenery it works in the show's favour. The beauty of the landscape masking the ugliness of its inhabitants and town. The performances are universally brilliant. Moss has a good grip on the accent and her Givens is a wonderfully combative mixture of stubbornness and vulnerability. Mullan may appear to be running on his "hard-bastard" mode initially but as the show progresses it becomes apparent that he is as much a wounded father as a hardened gangster. Then there's David Wenham playing the nicest on-the-take copper you ever met, Thomas M. Wright's reformed drug dealer who lives in a tent and Holly Hunter as JG, the weirdest character you are ever likely to see in a straight crime drama.

The series is satisfyingly short. There is no sense that story information is being withheld to stretch out running time or that the creators' eyes were looking at this being a franchise. What this simply is a mystery played out with wonderful attention to detail and something to say with an absolute start and finish. Top of the Lake might not feel that different from the slew of other series dealing with similar subject matter (The Killing and Broadchurch immediately spring to mind) but it manages to stand out with a unique setting, tone and characters. It might be a town run by vicious men but it's one held up by bruised and resilient women.