The Prestige

Year: 2006
Running time: 130 minutes
Certificate: 12
Language: English
Screenplay: Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan
Director: Christopher Nolan
Starring: Christian Bale, Hugh Jackman, Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson, Piper Perabo, Rebecca Hall, Samantha Mahurin, David Bowie, Andy Serkis 

Borden and Angier, in a rare moment of not scowling at one another.

Every now and again a film comes along and blows minds. Fight Club, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Matrix. There are, of course, many others. In this esteemed company is where, in my opinion, The Prestige belongs. It's an astonishing film from modern day Kubrick (or at least, if not quite there yet, is certainly on his way) and director of Memento, Inception and the glorious cinematic mind-bender Interstellar, Christopher Nolan.

Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) and Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) are both magicians who, due to a tragic mistake leading to the death of Angier's wife Julia McCullough (Piper Perabo), go from being great friends to bitter rivals. Borden and Angier each forge their own way and go to greater and greater lengths to outdo and sabotage each other. Eventually Borden gets the edge with the unbeatable trick 'The Transported Man', in which he appears to walk into one door and out another on the other side of the stage. Maddened and desperate to work out how he does it, Angier becomes ever more bitter and vicious. The more the rivalry spirals out of control, the worse the acts Borden and Angier inflict on each other are until murder rears its ugly head.

In the leads, Bale and Jackman are both intense and mesmerising, and Michael Caine as mentor to both of them Cutter threatens to steal the show on more than one occasion.

Michael Caine's Cutter and the under-used Scarlett Johansson as

Olivia Wenscombe, Angier's glamourous onstage assistant.

Everything about the production is extremely high quality, from set design and costumes to sound and cinematography - following Borden's encrypted notes on a possible trail to the secret of The Transported Man, Angier finds himself talking to Nikola Tesla (played to eccentric perfection by David Bowie) and the moment when he is suddenly surrounded by a field of blazing lights is a gorgeous, awe-inspiring moment.

Refreshingly, the film isn't interested in making things easy for the viewer, and you need to pay attention to make sense of the fractured chronology. The meticulously detailed script lays the foundations, but, like the best magic tricks, leaves you astonished and trying to work out exactly what happened. It demands multiple viewings and even then, there is room for near endless debate about exactly what took place.

An incredibly well crafted film, The Prestige  is spine tingling and keeps you holding your breath on the edge of your seat until the very end.

Score: 8/10

The Prestige is well-loved - see this review by Philip at The Guardian and this one from Czarina.

Night Watch & Day Watch

Year: 2004 (Night Watch), 2006 (Day Watch)
Running time: 114 minutes (Night Watch), 132 minutes (Day Watch)
Certificate: 15
Language: Russian
Screenplay: Laeta Kalogridis (Night Watch), Alexander Talal (Day Watch), Timur Bekmambetov
Director: Timur Bekmambetov
Starring: Konstantin Khabensky, Maria Poroshina, Vladimir Menshov, Valery Zolotukhin, Galina Tyunina, Dmitry Martynov, Yuri Kutsenko, Aleksey Chadov, Zhanna Friske, Viktor Verzhbitsky

Anton has his eye on some treaty-breakers.

Night Watch was released to a reputation of hype. Based on the first third of the book of the same name, Night Watch promised a uniquely mind-blowing treat. In truth, it was fun, but ultimately needed to spend more time making sense than trying to be cool. We find ourselves in the middle of an uneasy truce in the eternal battle between good and evil, with each side policing the other to ensure the truce is held to. The light side have the night watch, who keep an eye on their enemies during the darker hours, while the evil-doers have the day watch to maintain constant vigilance on the other side. Without the truce, the two sides are so evenly matched the only possible outcome to all out war would be mutual destruction. A new struggle emerges, with each side relying on the free will of others choosing which side to join, each side trying to find a way to tip the balance of power in their favour.

When we first meet the story's main protagonist Anton (Konstantin Khabensky) he is on the verge of striking a deal with a witch to get his wife to come back to him. A deal which will involve the miscarriage of her child. Before the deal can be struck, the witch is stopped by officers of the night watch and it soon becomes apparent than Anton is an 'other' and then we move forward 12 years where we see Anton has joined the night watch. One striking thing about these films is the shades of grey blurring the lines between light and dark, Anton's terrible unfulfilled deal being an obvious example of this.

What follows is a high octane, tension-filled coolfest that is great fun to watch, if sometimes a little difficult to follow. There are some slightly dodgy effects at times, but considering what must have been a fairly low budget, they hold up relatively well.

While on the trail of a vampire who is intending to feed on 12 year-old boy Yegor (Dmitry Martynov), Anton sees a terrifying vision of a woman who appears to be under a terrible curse, and then manages to kill one of the vampires while saving Yegor. Killing a member of the day watch brings a boatload of crap down on Anton's head and it also turns out that the woman he saw is Svetlana (Maria Poroshina), who has a 'vortex of damnation' above her head (as you do). In addition to this, Yegor is Anton's son, the one he almost killed to strike a deal with a witch 12 years ago.

The climax is suitably spectacular, but it also contains some though-provoking ideas, as the light-side Anton sees bad decisions he made earlier in his life come back not only to bite him, but to significantly shift the odds in dark-side's favour, as Yegor turns out to be a long-prophesised powerful other that has now chosen the side of evil. It elegantly posits the assertion that you can claim to be on the side of good all you like, but if your actions are evil, you will reap the consequences.

That was one way to get ahead of the traffic.

There appears to be some confusion about this, but it seems (according to Wikipedia) the sequel Day Watch, filmed at the same time, covers the events in the final two thirds of the book Night Watch, and not, confusingly, the book sequel Day Watch. It seems that there was an intention to make it a trilogy, but we're still waiting on Twilight Watch. Like the first movie, Day Watch is fast paced, beautifully stylised and occasionally baffling.

Early on, we're introduced to the highly unusual McGuffin, the Chalk of Fate. Apparently this is a piece of chalk that one can use to change decisions you made in the past that have turned out shitty. Despite his son choosing the dark, Anton tries his best to protect Yegor and covers up his treaty-violating attacks on humans. Agents of both sides race for the Chalk, Yegor resents Svetlana's growing relationship with his father and the whole thing culminates in most of Moscow being destroyed when the centuries old stalemate is broken. Not many people get the kind of second chance Anton does here, as he uses the Chalk of Fate to reverse the terrible decision he made right back at the start of Night Watch, thereby restoring Moscow, the truce and wiping the events of the two films from history (although not from the memory of some of the main characters).

To some this might seem some kind of Bobby Ewing-in-the-shower type of cop-out, but it feels right to me having events come full circle, leaving you with the determination not to make bad decisions before it's too late to reverse their consequences.

Lots of fun. Not as mind blowingly revolutionary as The Matrix, which is clearly a big influence, but enough smarts under the extensive special effects to get you thinking.

Score:
Night Watch: 7/10
Day Watch: 7/10

Opinion on these movies seems to be mixed to good, so I seem to generally be with the majority - for example this review of Night Watch by Steve and this one of its sequel at Cherub Cow.

The Holiday

Year: 2006
Running time: 138 minutes
Certificate: 12A
Language: English
Screenplay: Nancy Meyers

Director: Nancy Meyers
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Jack Black, Eli Wallach, Rufus Sewell, Edward Burns

Amanda and Graham take refuge in a home-made den.

I am ashamed to admit that I have a prejudice. It’s true. Romantic comedies are generally crap. Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. I’m sorry, I can’t help it. It was a wonderful genre, back in the time that scenes in this movie allude to, when they had sparkle, originality, when they were fun (see Some Like It Hot, It Happened One Night, Pillow Talk and countless others). But now, the genre is choking to death on one too many Sweet Home Alabamas (and that’s nothing against Reese Witherspoon, who in the right role is wonderful).

Well, there are always exceptions, and The Holiday goes some way to restoring some of my faith in the rom-com. Of course, casting four cracking lead actors goes a long way to make this what it is; without them, this would likely be barely average.

Iris (Kate Winslet) is a journalist writing a wedding column suffering from unrequited love; she pines after Jasper (Rufus Sewell), a sorry excuse for a human who clearly intends to string Iris along for as long as he can while continuing his other relationship. Amanda (Cameron Diaz) is a trailer producer in LA who has just kicked out her unfaithful boyfriend Ethan (Edward Burns). In an attempt to leave their disastrous relationships behind, they spend some time in each other's homes via a house-swap holiday website.

While on the other side of the world for a holiday, both women fall in love with new men, because of course they do. Amanda meets Graham (Jude Law), Iris' brother and impossibly perfect widowed father of two adorable children. Iris meets elderly retired screenwriter Arthur (Eli Wallach) and composer Miles (Jack Black). It is Iris' story that I find to be more absorbing, as both Arthur and Miles are infused with a love of film, be it explaining the 'meet-cute' or discussing favourite soundtracks, and, frankly, I could listen to that shit all day long.

Iris and Miles talk soundtracks.

Other things lifting this out of the myriad of mediocrity that is this genre include the lovely English Winter scenery and the accomplished direction of Nancy Meyers - I think being a writer-director in this type of genre means she may not have got the credit her skill deserves - What Women Want and Something's Gotta Give are other examples of her quietly professional style.

It's not all good, though - Meyers' direction is better than her writing here. The dialogue is clunky at times, and it is Winslet that gets the majority of the most difficult lines. Even with so fantastic an actor, some moments of dialogue just don't work. In addition, the final scene of all these fabulously rich and deliriously happy white folks enjoying themselves in a giant mansion having overcome their problems which were never really problems to begin with (like not being able to cry - turns out she just needed to be away from Jude Law for a while) genuinely makes me want to punch them all. I do try not to let that ruin the rest of the film for me, however.

Overall, this is funny, warm and romantic but entirely unmemorable; just what you need for some brain-disengaging entertainment for the holidays. Which begs the question why I'm reviewing it in August. Oh well.

Score:  6/10

The Holiday is not particularly well-reviewed out there - see this one from Richard Roeper, for example. And Peter at the Guardian really didn't like it.

A Bug's Life

Year: 1998
Running time: 95 minutes
Certificate: U
Language: English
Screenplay: Andrew Stanton, Don McEnery, Bob Shaw
Directors: John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton
Starring (voices): Dave Foley, Kevin Spacey, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, Hayden Panettiere, Phyllis Diller, Richard Kind, David Hyde Pierce, Joe Ranft, Denis Leary, Jonathan Harris, Madeline Kahn, Bonnie Hunt, Michael McShane, John Ratzenberger, Brad Garrett

Now that's the look of an ant that's done something stupid.

Along with Cars, its sequel and more recently The Good Dinosaur, A Bug’s Life is generally considered one of Pixar’s least impressive releases to date. Of course, it is Pixar, so that means little, and it still tells a quality story full of great characters brought to life by bright and beautiful animation and a superb cast of voices (particularly good are Dennis Leary as bad tempered ladybird Francis – “So, just because I’m a ladybug it automatically makes me a girl, is that it fly boy?” and David Hyde Pierce as posh stick insect Slim – “I’m the only stick with eyeballs!”).

Flik (Dave Foley) is an ant that doesn’t fit in with the rest of his colony. He likes to invent things to improve the way the ants do things, but his natural clumsiness thwarts him every time. The only person who likes him is Dot (Hayden Panettiere), a little princess eager to grow up as quickly as possible. Flik's colony is under the thumb of a bullying group of grasshoppers led by Kevin Spacey’s Hopper. Spacey's delivery is note-perfect as you might expect, with Hopper unpredictably switching from comedy to genuine menace on a dime. Hopper’s gang force the ants to provide them with an offering of food before they are allowed to collect for themselves.

Flik and his new friends on the look out.

When Flik’s well-meaning attempt to help accidentally deposits the offering in a nearby stream the colony leaders conspire to trick him into leaving the colony, on a mission to find some ‘tough bugs’ to protect them from Hopper and co. The others assume they’ve got rid of him on a wild goose chase, but Flik actually succeeds. Sort of. He employs a troop of circus bugs who mistake him for a talent scout. In the way these things tend to play out, challenges are faced and overcome, the day is saved, outsiders are accepted and lessons about being true to oneself and standing together in the face of adversity are learned. As is usual with Pixar, this rather clichéd resolution is accomplished in a delightfully funny and unorthodox manner.

Targeted at audiences a little younger than many of the better Pixar releases it may be, but it’s still great fun.

Score: 7/10

Despite being minor Pixar, A Bug's Life is pretty well reviewed out there - see this review from James at Reelviews and this one from Nathan at the A.V. Club.

The Frighteners

Year: 1996
Running time: 110 minutes
Certificate: 15
Language: English
Screenplay: Fran Walsh, Peter Jackson
Director: Peter Jackson
Starring: Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvarado, Peter Dobson, John Astin, Chi McBride, Jim Fyfe, Jeffrey Combs, Dee Wallace, Jake Busey, Troy Evans, Julianna McCarthy, R. Lee Ermey, Elizabeth Hawthorne, Angela Bloomfield

Frank with his spectral business partners.

The Frighteners is an example of post-splatter but pre-Rings Peter Jackson, and is very much recognisable as his work. The manic energy and unusually imaginative camera angles are present and correct, and in addition there are a number of Jackson-esque gags and some surprisingly dark moments.

Frank Bannister (Michael J. Fox) is a paranormal investigator, taking jobs getting rid of ghosts haunting the houses of punters. But he's a conman. A traumatic incident in his past has left him capable of seeing the dead. Rather than freak out in a Sixth Sense kind of way, Bannister senses a business opportunity and goes into business with three ghosts The Judge (John Astin), Cyrus (Chi McBride) and Stuart (Jim Fyfe). They agree to haunt the houses and point the marks in his direction (although I'm not entirely sure why they'd bother, being dead an' all).

Before long Frank starts to see another apparition, one that is killing the living. Before each victim is offed, a number appears burned into their head, visible only to Frank's second sight. Shaken from his stupor, Frank goes after the killer ghost before it kills anyone else. Watching this, as with watching Back to the Future, there is a bittersweet feeling for the lost roles Michael J. Fox might have played, had it not been for his illness. He is a likeable leading man, and even though you know his Frank Bannister is dishonest at the start of the film, you still root for him - Fox has a gift for keeping the trauma of Bannister's past just below the surface.

The comedy dries up entirely as Frank and Lucy relive a grisly massacre.

While there is much comedy in The Frighteners, there are scenes that are genuinely disturbing as well, in particular a sequence in a hospital where Bannister and Lucy Lynskey (Trini Alvarado), a widow for whom Frank had agreed to be a medium, talking to her recently deceased husband Ray (Peter Dobson), relive a gut-wrenching murder spree through visions.

Like Heavenly Creatures, this seemed like a testing ground before stepping up to bigger projects, and I would imagine that New Line found themselves with a fair bit of confidence in Jackson’s directing ability after seeing this.

Score: 7/10

It seems The Frighteners isn't everybody's cup of tea. Time Out thought it was alright. Ebert really didn't like it much though.

Catch Me If You Can

Year: 2002
Running time: 141 minutes
Certificate: 12
Language: English
Screenplay: Jeff Nathanson
Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks, Christopher Walken, Nathalie Baye, Martin Sheen, Amy Adams, Jennifer Garner

Frank Abagnale Jr. faking the high life.

Just after the turn of the millennium, Steven Spielberg directed three films that marked the start of a kind of reinvigoration. It's not like he'd become a bad director or anything, but this trio of films seemed to kick-start a new period of inspiration for the director, and with last year's outstanding Bridge of Spies and a new version of The BFG not far away, it hasn't stopped yet. It's a bit like Bruce Springsteen and The Rising. And what’s more, he seems to be improving with age. Catch Me If You Can made up one of those three films, along with Minority Report and A.I. Artificial Intelligence. Lightest in tone of the three, it is a wonderful story, skilfully told, about a boy who runs away from home and forges more than $4 million worth of cheques while impersonating an airline pilot, a doctor and a lawyer. Brilliantly, this is based on a true-life account; that of Frank Abagnale Jr. (Leonardo DiCaprio).

As with many Spielberg films, it is a broken family unit that sits at the heart of the story – it is the breakdown of young Franks’ parents’ marriage that is the catalyst for these events. In his youth Frank idolises his father Frank Sr. (Christopher Walken). When told his parents have split up and he must choose which one of them to live with, Frank makes a run for it and doesn't look back. As Frank forges a living he sparks the interest of F.B.I. agent Carl Hanratty (Tom Hanks) who invests years in the chase of cat and mouse.

It is this relationship that forms the core of the story; the two move from grudging respect to genuine friendship, with Frank making a point of calling Carl on Christmas Day just to be able to talk to someone who understands him.

Carl Hanratty, closing in on Frank.

Decap is on fine form, and of course, Tom Hanks is as good as ever, but what makes this such a joy is the way they work so well together; it’s almost like watching Rock Hudson and Doris Day. It goes without saying that Christopher Walken as down-on-his-luck Frank Sr. is great to watch – that man is truly a highlight in any film he’s in.

Another standout is John Williams' beautiful jazzy score; a departure for both Williams and Spielberg which really compliments the light and breezy feel that much of the film is saturated in. The stylish animation and jazzy music that form the opening credits are wonderful and really highlight that this is a change or tone for the director, falling somewhere in between the crowd-pleasers and the Oscar-baiting 'serious' ones.

It may be just a touch too long, but this can be forgiven when it’s so much fun to watch.

Score: 7/10

There's a lot of love out there for Catch Me If You Can, as evidenced by this review from Mark at Empire and this one from Stephen at the New York Times.

12 Monkeys

Year: 1995
Running time: 129 minutes
Certificate: 15
Language: English
Screenplay: David Peoples, Janet Peoples
Director: Terry Gilliam
Starring: Bruce Willis, Madeline Stowe, Brad Pitt, Christopher Plummer, David Morse

Cole meets Jeffrey Goines, possibly setting the whole thing in motion.

It would seem, based on his cinematic output, Terry Gilliam the director is completely insane. But, luckily for us, he’s also a total genius, and 12 Monkeys is proof of both. Set in a bleak future where the surviving 1% of the human race has been driven underground by a deadly virus released in 1997, James Cole (Bruce Willis in a role which, along with The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, shows that he has acting talent far beyond what he’s often given credit for), is selected by a group of ruling scientists to go back in time to try to collect a sample to bring back, which they hope will help them reclaim the surface, long since the domain of wild animals. What follows is a fractured, mind-bending ride.

Cole is sent back too far at first, all the way to 1990, where he is promptly locked up in a mental institution. While here he meets the manically insane but oddly charismatic Jeffrey Goines (Brad Pitt, in a film highlight), an animal rights activist whose scientist father (Christopher Plummer) is experimenting on lab animals using the very virus that almost wipes out the species. He also meets psychiatrist Kathryn Railly (Madeline Stowe). Moving in time again to the original target of 1996 (via a quick detour to WWI, where he conveniently gets his photo taken), Cole kidnaps Railly in an attempt to prove that his insane story is true. They find their way into Goines' underground movement the Army of the 12 Monkeys, which Cole is convinced are responsible for the release of the mutated virus.

Battered in mind and body, Cole begins to doubt his sanity, wondering if he really is a time-traveller after all. In a great juxtaposition, Railly begins to find evidence showing that Cole's story really is true. As the audience, Gilliam keep us as off-balance as Cole with jarring framing devices and connections made across time periods, even referencing a scene from Hitchcock's Vertigo; the twisting plot really does defy expectation.

Cole and Railly, doomed to attempt to change the unchangeable.

The pieces come together during the course of the second half, when Cole and Railly try to change the course of the future, which turns out to be impossible, as Cole knew all along, although he still couldn't stop himself from trying; a pretty perfect distillation of what it means to be human. The climax takes place at an airport where a young Cole sees himself, living out a recurring dream that has haunted him for years. One of the best things about this film is the unconventional ending, which refuses to break the rules it has established - the timeline cannot be altered, and our hero ultimately fails and loses his life in the process. You get the feeling that the Hollywood machine would have gone down the Back to the Future route and had Cole saving the world. Thank the gods of cinema for Gilliam's artistic integrity.

However, when we see one of the scientists from the future on the plane at the end, we’re given a little glimmer of possibility that maybe he did enough to give a ray of hope to the future - they finally have their sample, and now maybe they can begin to rebuild.

Disorienting, striking and uncompromising, this is a lasting testament to the film-making genius of Terry Gilliam.

Score: 8/10

12 Monkeys is very well-liked out there, as shown by this review from Peter at Rolling Stone, but while she also has some positive things to say, this review from Katie offers a different perspective.