Film Review: 12 Years a Slave

12 Years a Slave. Rated MA15+ (strong themes and violence). 134 minutes. Directed by Steve McQueen. Screenplay by John Ridley. Based on the memoir by Solomon Northup.

Verdict: A perfect film about a far from perfect world.

It’s rare that a film manages to transport you into the heart of another time and place so completely – to the point where when you emerge from the cinema, everything around you feels strangely unfamiliar.

McQueen’s (Hunger, Shame) and Ridley’s forensic examination of the psychological and physical horrors of slavery is an intensely gruelling experience, with an extreme level of anxiety constantly powering the saga. Even though it is beautifully framed and photographed by McQueen’s frequent collaborator, cinematographer Sean Bobbitt, the perfect lighting in every shot makes the horror of what is happening in the story even more challenging to watch.

Chiwetel Ejiofor (Children of Men, Salt) is excellent as freeman Solomon Northup who is kidnapped, shipped to New Orleans and sold into slavery. Separated from his wife and two children, Solomon is passed from plantation owner William Ford (a conscious-stricken Benedict Cumberbatch) to Edwin Epps (Michael Fassbender, on fire), where the torment inflicted on Solomon and his fellow slaves reaches an almost unwatchable zenith.

As the young female slave Patsey, Lupita Nyong'o (making her debut) is astonishing, delivering an unforgettable performance of such extraordinary depth that it defies comprehension. In what should have been an un-actable scene where Patsey begs Solomon to end her tormented existence by killing her, you may well find yourself hoping he obliges.

12 Years a Slave is a difficult film to experience. The film-makers waste no time plunging us into a world in which a noble, talented man finds himself not only powerless, but with no visible means of escape from a nightmare of someone else’s making. My lasting memory, days later, is of a beautiful world devouring itself from the inside out.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.

Film Review: RoboCop

RoboCop. Rated M (science fiction themes and violence). 117 minutes. Directed by José Padilha. Screenplay by Joshua Zetumer.

Verdict: A slick remake of an unforgettable classic.

Remakes (or the current ‘buzz word’ reboots), are continuing to sweep through Hollywood like a plague, with Godzilla, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Endless Love and even little orphan Annie just a few of the titles lining up for release this year. The first remake off the rank is this slick entry into what will become a very crowded field.

If you haven’t seen Paul Verhoeven’s celebrated original, released in 1987, there’s much to engage with in this re-telling of the story of adoring father, husband and Detroit policeman Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman).

Fearing the police are closing in on their illegal weapons trade, Murphy is targeted by the gang who almost kill him by blowing up his car. When he regains consciousness, Murphy discovers that technology company OmniCorp, led by CEO Raymond Sellars (Michael Keaton), has encased what remained of his body into a state-of-the-art robotic suit. Sellars needs to win the trust of the American people by humanising the company’s robot soldiers that are seen as ruthless killing machines, incapable of considering how dangerous situations might be resolved with less brutal efficiency.

As was the case in the original, the themes of greed and exploitation play out in an ethically challenged minefield – with the rules of engagement starkly illustrated in the film’s opening sequences set in a US-occupied Tehran. When OmniCorp’s drones kill an innocent Iranian boy during a live cross to Pat Novak’s (Samuel L. Jackson) television program, the political pressure on the corporation results in Dr Dennett Norton (Gary Oldman) being given permission to go to whatever lengths are necessary to develop a more humanised version of the drones.

While it certainly suffers by comparison to the original, Padilha’s less boisterous version still wields a significant amount of clout, with the consequences of the story still as thought-provoking as they were back in 1987. And that just may be the point.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.

Film Review: Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. Rated M (mature themes, violence and coarse language). 141 minutes. Directed by Justin Chadwick. Screenplay by William Nicholson. Based on Nelson Mandela’s autobiography.

Verdict: A reverential, by-the-numbers biopic from which we learn almost nothing.

Depending on how many details of the subject’s life audiences are familiar with can change everything about the extent to which we engage with biopics on the big screen.

In the case of Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first democratically elected president, Nicholson cherry-picks key points to create an extensive catalogue of great man’s life and achievements. What he and Chadwick fail to do is reveal any insight into their subject’s mind – resulting in a ‘best of’ showreel that lacks any form of deep, critical psychological engagement with what drove the man.

That privilege is reserved for Naomie Harris’s (Skyfall) Winnie Madikizela (later Winnie Mandela). In concert with Idris Elba’s (Pacific Rim, Thor) imposing stride-through the title role, Harris blazes across the screen in a performance that encapsulates the rage against injustice that Winnie Mandela would later pay dearly for. Harris’s performance is blisteringly good, and in context, it’s impossible to believe that Mandela went through life’s ordeals with the same kind peaceful resolve he maintained in later life as one of the world’s great statesmen.

The scenes of his early life as a womanising, young lawyer who finds himself attracted to the revolutionary activities of the African National Congress (of which he would become leader) are biopic-by-the-numbers. Until we witness a very brief scene (sourced from archival footage) of a white woman being violently knocked to the ground in the street by black activists, do Chadwick or Nicholson want us to be overly concerned with all sides of the seriously conflicted points of view.

What we are left with, ultimately, is a long, reverential film that honours Mandela’s memory as much as it does the value of it something of a disservice.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.

Film Review: Grudge Match

Grudge Match. Rated M (sporting violence and coarse language). 113 minutes. Directed by Peter Segal. Screenplay by Tim Kelleher and Rodney Rothman.

Verdict: Great idea on paper.

In theory at least, the cinematic possibilities of casting Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro in a film about boxers coming out of retirement to settle an old score, are obvious and irresistible. Stallone’s Rocky Balboa (first introduced to us in 1976’s Rocky), remains one of cinema’s most celebrated and instantly recognisable characters. De Niro’s performance as Jake LaMotta in Martin Scorsese’s masterpiece Raging Bull (1980), is regarded as one of the finest ever committed to film.

So is it fair to compare this ordinary outing to the vastly superior films from which it takes its attention-seeking premise? While Grudge Match never comes close to being a worthy companion to either those characters or the films in which they appeared to be forever burned into our memory, there is a curiosity bordering on the bizzare in watching Stallone as Henry 'Razor' Sharp and De Niro as Billy 'The Kid' McDonnen muddle their way through Kelleher and Rothman’s cliché-stricken script that never even begins to rise to the occasion.

Segal’s overly-reverential direction abandons his stars to flounder in the sense of their own, now-fading magnificence, while the scenes that come close to working (De Niro pleading with Stallone to go through with the fight outside his house one night simmers beautifully) are too few and far between.

The supporting cast, including the exceptional Jon Bernthal (Snitch, The Walking Dead) as McDonnen’s son BJ and the veteran Alan Arkin (Argo, Little Miss Sunshine) as Sharp’s trainer Louis who has seen better days, contribute fine work – arguably all the more effective because they appear saddled with less baggage from the glorious past. It is also a past that Grudge Match seeks to capitalise on, and one that ultimately brings De Niro, Stallone and the film itself down to earth with a deafening and somewhat embarrassing thud.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.