THE END WE START FROM** - BFI London Film Festival 2023 - Day 10

Contemporary England is subject to horrific and sustained rainfall resulting in devastating flooding.  Low lying cities are laid to waste and people scramble to find shelter in higher ground. Soon humanity turns on itself, trampling on each other for scarce food parcels. Some choose to find shelter and blissful isolation in island communes. Others choose to cling onto their past, their memories and some kind of future. 

Within this world, we meet Jodie Comer (Killing Eve) - a young hairdresser - and her husband (Joel Fry).  She gives birth on the night of the flood, and our threesome have to somehow navigate this disaster with a small baby.  The high concept of the film is to show us the everyday frustrations of being a mother in this context. Comer's character finds companionship with another mother played by Katherine Waterston. It's a touching and rarely seen story of shared burdens, sympathy, and female friendship and strength. 

Mahalia Belo’s debut directorial feature has a lot going for it - an assured visual style; some stunning landscape shots; and some haunting CGI-effect depictions of a post-flood London achieved on what was presumably a small budget.  Belo even elicits good performances from her cast - not least the deeply talented Jodie Comer in the lead role, but also Katherine Waterston who arguably has the best-written character.  

The problem with the film, based on a novel by Megan Hunter adapted by screenwriter Alice Birch, is that it feels underwritten. There is very little that is new in disaster movies, to be sure, and this film has nothing new to say about the likely human response other than combining it with he insecurities and trials of new motherhood. Even worse, the characters feel underwritten. I didn't feel that Comer had anything much to do here (contrast with her exceptional performance in THE BIKERIDERS).  Poor Joel Fry has even less to do. There's a moment at the end which is meant to be very deeply affecting but as I didn't really believe in the characters of their relationship outside of Comer and Waterston, that moment had no impact on me. We also have a handful of cameos, but none of them really amount to much. 

So, while I very much look forward to seeing what Belo does next, I hope she has a stronger script to work with.

THE END WE START WITH has a running time of 96 minutes. It played Toronto and London 2023. It will be released in the USA on December 8th and in the UK on January 19th 2024.

PHANTOM THREAD

Where to begin with this strange slippery film?  It's genre, tone, dramatic tensions shift and evolve over its two hour running time until it becomes something quite hard to pin down? Is it a melodramatic period romance like THE BEGUILED? A Hitchcockian psychological thriller?  A generational ghost story? A fetishistic romance like THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY?  It's a film that certainly delights and repays the audience with a knowledge of film history. And yet it's something quite hermetically sealed and delicately balanced between difference style of film-making.  It's a film one can imagine quite hard to pull off without an absolute conviction in what one was creating. But in its exploration of intense emotional relationships in a tightly proscribed world, it reminded me most of all of Peter Strickland's dreamy romance.

Daniel Day-Lewis (LINCOLN), in his final role, plays Reynolds Woodcock, a 1950s fashion designer who lives and works in a grand London house, complete with royal clientele. As the film opens, he is presented as the kind of domineering, egomaniacal man surrounded by sycophantic enablers that has become vilified in the #metoo movement. He lives by strict rules all designed to give him, the self-appointed genius creator the peace he needs to create. He fears discombobulation.  And in a sense there's a delicious irony in the fact that the first of his dresses that we see is comically ugly - it's the fawning delight of his clientele  - here Gina McKee - that tells us all we need to know.

Reynolds' perfect world is curated by his devoted sister Cyril (Lesley Manville - veteran of Ken Loach films). She neatly dismisses the young girls he takes as his muses when they become tiresome, and manages the financial side of the business.  As the film opens we see her dispatch one girl only for him to speed to the country and pick up another, mostly on the grounds that she looks biddable and can remember his vast breakfast order. Both women seem at his service.  The young Alma (Vicky Krieps), takes orders from him, becomes little more than an inanimate model, and hangs on his every word.  And so the relationship might follow the typical pattern.  Alma - scraping her butter onto her toast so very loudly - might soon be dismissed.

The beauty of this story is that it subverts our expectations of who is truly in control and indeed who are the true protagonists of the film. This is the way in which it most profoundly reminded me of THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY. One thinks this is going to be a film about subservient women but actually they are firmly in control. As the film progresses we see that Cyril very much rules Reynolds - forcing him to attend a wedding to keep the House in business - daring him to pick an argument that he cannot win.  Even the seamstresses are more in control than Reynolds - he is dependent on them to bring his designs to life.  

And so the principal tension of the film is not really between Reynolds and Alma - as we shall see later - he is only feigning resistance to her. It's actually between Alma and Cyril.  The young girl knows her mind and politely but firmly brooks no objections to her plans.  She is vying with the Cyril to take control of Reynolds, and by a masterful piece of skulduggery, wins. The question is how Reynolds will take to this change in reign, and it leads to a superlative set piece at the end of the movie, where very little is said, but suspicions are noted, and accepted.  It's quite the marvel. 

The result is a film with very clear themes if subtly slippery means of getting there. Reynolds misses his dead mother terribly to the point of almost willing her ghost into existence. He craves a replacement - first Cyril and then Alma.  He is forever ravenously hungry for nourishment, and at the most basic level, Alma provides it, naming him in their opening meeting "hungry boy".  What she gets out of the relationship is the ability to express her side of the fetish.  It is no coincidence that the most passionate kiss between the two that we are allowed to see in this very coy and ambiguous film comes when the sado-masochistic relationship is finally acknowledged on both sides. 

Everything about this production is first class - from the costumes, to the interior design, to the evocation of the British sea-side and 1950s ballrooms. The acting is also superb. Daniel Day-Lewis may be getting the awards, but Manville and Krieps match him turn by turn with performances of such subtlety and brilliance. The script is also fascinating, and funnier than one often expects from Anderson. Genuinely brilliantly funny.  There was only one scene that struck a bum note - when Reynolds and Alma look through a client's deep distress and mock and punish her for her drunken escape.  This was cruel - meant to be cruel - but lessened my interest in the characters. And this is ultimately my only real criticism of the film.  All of Anderson, and his cast and crews talents, on such a self-involved, and ultimately slight story. There's something a little disappointing in that - something small - lesser than THERE WILL BE BLOOD and THE MASTER. 

PHANTOM THREAD has a running time of 130 minutes and is rated R in the USA and 15 in the UK for strong language. The film was released last year in the USA and earlier this year in Canada. It goes on release this weekend in Singapore, Australia, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Kuwait, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, the UK and Ireland, It goes on release on February 14th in France, Denmark and Russia; on February 22nd in Brazil, Italy, Malaysia, Finland, Portugal, Sweden, Taiwan and Vietnam; on March 1st in Netherlands; on March 8th in Hong Kong and Estonia; on March 15th in Argentina; on April 13th in Norway and Turkey and on May 26th in Japan.

IN THE LOOP - superb British political satire

IN THE LOOP is a British political satire written and directed by Armando Iannucci - one of the best comedy writers in Britain today, with TV shows such as THE THICK OF IT, BRASS EYE, the ALAN PARTRIDGE series and THE DAY TODAY. Iannucci's specialises intelligent, excoriating, raucously funny depictions of the British political elite and the commentators, spin doctors and civil servants who surround it - the so-called Westminster Village. IN THE LOOP is his first feature film, a spin-off of the TV show THE THICK OF IT. It shows how ministers of state on both sides of the Atlantic are bounced into a war (clearly Iraq) by spin doctors, over-eager journos and the machinations of their superiors. Politicians are shown to be callow; spin-doctors manipulative and crass and the whole lot of them incompetent and self-serving.

The resulting film is shot with the bare minimum of competence on what was all too evidently a shoe-string budget. It could've easily been shown as an extended TV special. But no matter. My friends and I were laughing out-loud uproariously from start to finish - sometimes at the filthy language - more often at the Pure Comedy Gold. Admittedly, the pace of the film slackens in the second half, and a good twenty minutes could've been cut from the run-time. But despite this, we truly laughed from start to finish and were quoting lines and scenes on the way home. Particular praise for Tom Hollander as the British politician with a proclivity to say something controversial when faced with the press and for Peter Capaldi as the foul-mouthed, pugnacious spin-doctor. On the other side of the Atlantic, Zach Woods is particularly funny as the vitriolic, arse-licking aide. Oh yes, and there's a brilliant cameo from Steve Coogan as a disgruntled constituent.

IN THE LOOP played Sundance 2009 and is currently on release in the UK. It opens in the US on July 24th.

AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER? is too thin for its run-time and performances

AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER? is a low-budget British film based on an autobiography by poet Blake Morrison, adapted for the screen by David Nicholls of STARTER FOR TEN infamy. I'm sad to say that this movie is another rung in the downward trajectory of director Anand Tucker's career. I think this is because with every film he narrows his view-finder. In HILLARY AND JACKIE he had a story so twisted, iconic and passionate that it stood up to outstanding performances from Emily Watson, Rachel Griffiths, David Morrissey and James Frain. SHOPGIRL was beautifully shot and acted but felt very slight and narcissistic. And here we have another ninety minute film that is beautiful shot and (with the exception of the immobile Colin Firth) handsomely acted but still feels as if it has been stretched beyond its natural life.

Colin Firth plays a middle-aged man who has to confront his difficult relationship with his dying father, played by Jim Broadbent. The dad is a fantastic character: he's one of those larger than life characters that are fun to be around but sometimes crowd out a genuinely close emotional relationship. Jim Broadbent is an absolute joy to watch in the role. Juliet Stevenson plays his loving but sometimes ill-used wife and gives another great performance. There is a scene where she learns of her husband's death where we see her shaking with grief, her back to us, and it's simply brilliant. Colin Firth is passive and unresponsive as the son - a real hole in the middle of the film. As a result, I found myself empathising more with the teenage Blake Morrison of the extensive flashbacks, played with sensitivity by Matthew Beard.

Overall, this isn't a bad film. Apart from anything, it's lovely to see such sombre material leavened with some wicked black humour. I just thought that it could've done with a shorter run-time and a little less forced profundity. Fundamentally, your own childhood memories, much like your own dreams, are of interest to no-one but yourself.

AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER? played Toronto 2007 and is currently on release in the UK. It opens in the US in February 2008.

DVD round-up 1: SCENES OF A SEXUAL NATURE**

SCENES OF A SEXUAL NATURE is a mischieviously mis-titled movie. There is no rumpy pumpy on show. What we DO have is a number of couples on a sunny day on Hampstead Heath - a large park in North London with commanding views of the city. The couples are young, old; gay, straight; in mature relationships, blind dates, or being paid for their company. All of life is here, struggling to make a connection and be happy: the ultimate indulgent concern of the developed world's middle classes. The vignettes are alternatively funny, sad or awkward. But they are universally populated with well-known and high-class British character actors plus Ewan MacGregor for the marketing campaign. The vignettes are also, more unhappily, midly interesting to watch, but instantly forgettable. Still, it's considerably less contrived and twee than your usual Richard Curtis flick, and I look forward to seeing what writer Aschlin Ditta and director Ed Blum do next.

SCENES OF A SEXUAL NATURE was released in the UK in November 2006, is currently playing in Russia, and is available on DVD.

Random DVD round-up 3 - MIRRORMASK * or *****

I suspect that MIRRORMASK is the kind of film you either like an awful lot or that leaves you bored rigid. People in the former catgeory are likely to be fans of fantasy fiction and the visual arts - most of all fans of Neil Gaiman, upon whose work the film is based. The movie features a plucky fifteen-year old girl called Helena. She works in her parents circus but wants to be "normal". Her mother, played by the ever-brilliant Gina McKee, falls desperately ill, and Helena internalises her guilt into a dream-world where a good witch is ill and can only be saved by a mirrormask. It's a beautifully rendered film - mixing live action and puppetry. The visuals are beautiful and whimsical and it has a surreal, slightly disturbing Alice in Wonderland feel. The movie is populated by the sort of eccentric very British characters you might find in Gormenghast or Alice - odd librarians, dusty Prime Ministers and evil queens. The movie also features a number of cameos from great British character actors and comedians - not least Rob Brydon, Stephen Fry, and, ur, Lenny Henry. I didn't like this film very much at all, but then I am not a fan of fantasy films. The visuals were fantastic but there just wasn't enough plot to keep me hooked. But I can see that for the right viewer, this would be a wonderful movie - hence the alpha/gamma score.

MIRRORMASK was shown at Sundance 2005 and went on release in the UK in March 2006. It is available on Region 1 and 2 DVD.