Film Reviews by Timmy B

The winner of the Best Picture Oscar, Guillermo Del Toro's latest film is, like the rest of his work, deeply idiosyncratic & revels in its weirdness, which is a lesson a large number of other blockbusters could take a cue from. But it also has the other elements that make his films so unique, such as a fantastic soundtrack & beautiful look to them, even when what you are looking at is horrible.

The Shape of Water follows Elisa, a mute woman adopted at birth, who works as a custodian at a secure facility in Baltimore during the Cold War. Elisa is a woman whose life is defined by structure: every morning, she has the same routine and keeps herself to herself. She is also very kooky & childlike, as well as having a vivacious sexuality. One day, at the secure facility she works in, she sees a mysterious humanoid amphibian/alien creature brought in. Elisa becomes fascinated with the creature, eventually falling in love with it & plotting to free it from its confines/the brutal torture inflicted on it by the sadistic Colonel Strickland.

For many people, including some of the other reviewers here, they loathe this film because it is so strange. But to me, that's the best thing about it. We are invited to take the perspective not only of Elisa, but also the creature who is captured. And the collection of strange & surreal characters that this film lovingly surrounds you with is a joy to be around.

The performances are also great. Front and center of all of this is the wonderful Sally Hawkins. As someone who had only ever seen her in bit parts/supporting roles before, here she is a revelation. She is a wonderful & exuberant protagonist, a warm & funny guide to this strange world. Michael Shannon & Octavia Spencer also are great. The creature itself is also perfectly realised, a combination of CGI & costume.

This film absolutely is not for everyone, but I loved it, as well as being moved by it. It is a great adventure & highly enjoyable.

The first Fifty Shades film was by no means a masterpiece, however there was a certain fun to be had watching it. It was very competently directed by Sam Taylor-Wood, had a half-decent script by Kelly Marcel & didn't take itself too seriously. However, despite the enormous creative control she already had with the first film, E.L James by all accounts hated it, as well as being stung by the criticism levelled at it.

So for the second & third films, she took over completely, hiring her husband as the scriptwriter & changing the director to James Foley, who seemed to have only turned up for the cheque. The 2nd film was not great, but there was still something about it which made it half-enjoyable, mainly it's campiness which sometimes raised a laugh or smile. However, all of that is basically lost in the third film.

After the events of the previous film, Anastasia & Christian have married and should be in matrimonial bliss, especially considering the obscene wealth Grey has. But the threats that were in the previous film have not gone away, plus there are some new additions to the villainy as well. Alongside all of this, Anastasia discovers she is pregnant & starts to have second thoughts about the relationship she is now supposedly committed to.

Everything here doesn't work, whether its the chemistry between Dornan & Johnson, the script which a first year screenwriter would have thrown back at them, or the weak attempts to create tension from laughable situations. For example, the main villain is Anastasia's ex boss Jack Hyde, who is basically a carbon copy of Grey (and who you feel was the actor originally cast as the lead role, then lost it, but was kept around in case Dornan flunked out.) The two men are meant to be alpha-males who constantly butt heads and have extreme prescence on screen... they end up looking like a couple of posh boys who decided to hit the gym to get stacked, but who would cry if their lunch money got stolen.

The story staggers on, with enough soapy emotions & situations to provide a year's worth of scripts on Corrie or Hollyoaks. But what is most staggering, continuing on a running theme from the previous two films, is how even incredible actors have their abilities lowered as soon as they step on the set. For example, Jennifer Ehle and Marcia Gay Harden are Oscar/Tony Award-winning actresses, women of staggering ability & talent. Here, they play barely one-dimensional characters and even that's being generous. The same goes for Dornan & Johnson.

The result is something which, like other products of Hollywood, made herculean amounts of money, filled up cinemas (never a bad thing,) and left probably most of the people leaving it wanting their money back.

For the final time, it has to be said: if you want to watch 2 good-looking but vapid people having sex in various plush surroundings, buy a porn film. At least the acting will be better and the sex real...

François Ozon continues his run of provocative, unpredictable but also engrossing films. Whilst many of the other reviews criticised the length and pace of this film, for me it was actually pretty well balanced.

The story is about a woman called Chloé, who when we meet her is suffering from unexplained abdominal pains. She is told that nothing is wrong with her physically and that she should consult a psychiatrist. She goes to see Paul and the two eventually become romantically involved & move in together. However, she discovers that Paul is concealing his real identity, which starts to really mess with Chloé and her emotions.

One of the things I liked most about the film was the fact that it did not take any shortcuts and really leaned into the erotic & sexually duplicitous side of the story. This is a properly adult-film/thriller, with committed performances from both actors. The script also has enough moments to keep you guessing and the twists are really well worked into the story.

If you are expecting a quick moving & fast-paced story, there is no point you watching. This film takes its time setting up the story & slowly ratcheting up the tension. The result is a solid & intriguing film, well-worth your time and attention.

I rented this film due to the massive critical praise, particularly the 5 star Empire review, which absolutely raved about it. Otherwise, I would never have rented it, as sports movies on the whole are not the sort of films I am that interested in. And I am so glad I did. This is a wonderful, deeply human and compassionate film, looking at how from even the bleakest of situations, hope & promise can be found. It also features a star-making turn from Joe Cole.

Billy Moore is a Liverpudlian man who lives in Thailand. At the start of the film, he is involved in both professional boxing & drug dealing/petty crime. After a dawn raid, he is arrested & convicted of drug possession and sentenced to 3 years in the notorious Klong Prem prison. A literal hell-on-Earth, the prisoners are at the whim of the brutal guards, as well as the high-ranking gang members incarcerated in the cells with them. Whilst at first Moore spirals rapidly downhill mentally, he then is welcomed into the gym/Muay Thai boxing team, which in turn supports him & enables him to start to believe he has a future again. Moore then becomes the first non-Thai to fight in the prison Muay-Thai championships.

The best part of this film and, to be clear, the reason it works so well, is down to Joe Cole's stunning performance as well as the beautiful direction by Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire. This film really delves deep into not only Moore's emotions, but also the strong bonds formed not only with the other prisoners but also the boxers within the gym. They are broken, troubled & yes some of them deeply immoral, dangerous men. But this film seeks to show a different side, as well as the incredible redemptive power of sport, particularly boxing.

Don't be put off by the subtitles or the fact that it is marketed as a sports film. This is a warm, thoughtful and deeply moving film with an incredible Cole at its core.

Essential viewing

Ben Wheatley has had a career that defies the fairly standard director's output/filmography. He has effortlessly moved between horror, comedy & action. But this movie, his 2nd full film but the first to really draw attention to him, is a visceral & shocking journey into a darkness few films go near.

Jay & Gal are two friends who served in the army together & now make their living as contract killers. They are wildly different personalities, Jay clearly suffering from PTSD after a disastrous mission in Kiev, whereas Gal is more stable. Jay's relationship is on the verge of breakdown due to financial issues, until the pair are hired by a mysterious & ominous client to carry out three contract killings. However, the hits turn out to be anything but simple...

As referenced in the title, this film is unbelievably distressing in many ways. The level of violence is genuinely unsettling & horrific which, when coupled with the constant threat in the air, really becomes a sadistic journey into hell. However, I do say this as someone who isn't a big watcher of horror films, so there will be people for whom this is not that shocking.

The most successful element of this film is splicing the hitman genre with a combination of horror & the occult. This is a film where mysterious happenings occur, where people who seem innocent are anything but. And screaming through all of this is constant presence of threat & dread, seeping out of every pore. If you were living in this world, you'd be constantly checking over your shoulder, not trusting anyone & doing everything possible to get out of the living hell you were existing in.

The performances are great, especially the two leads. Neil Maskell & Michael Smiley are a fantastic double act, perfectly complimenting each other. Unlike In Bruges, which looked at two hitmen & their journey in a relatively warm way, Kill List affords it's protagonists no such luxury. I was also extremely impressed with MyAnna Buring, who has built up an impressive career with supporting performances. Shel is on the surface a loving & understanding wife trying to deal with a clearly damaged husband, but also has her own significant issues, as well as a hair-trigger temper.

But what makes this film stand out is that as much as the violence & story is shocking, the script is also excellent & the various elements work well together. By no stretch of the imagination is this simply a film full of shocking moments which only seeks to be provocative. It is an unforgettable journey into the abyss.

After a series of films featuring male protagonists, Martin McDonagh wanted to write a story showing a woman's journey. But, being Martin McDonagh, this was never going to be an easy watch about light subject matter. As anyone who has had experience of his work knows, the worlds he creates are full of harsh & sometimes dispicible characters, sudden violence and deeply questionable choices. But this is also why he is such a master storyteller.

Mildred Hayes is a broken & emotionally destroyed woman: a mother whose daughter has been taken from her & killed in the most upsetting & horrific way imaginable. Despite a police investigation, no-one has been charged & the case has stalled. Mildred decides to take matters into her own hands, renting out 3 disused billboards & putting on them a message excoriating the lack of action from the police, directly criticising Chief Willoughby. Whilst this generates headlines, it also has ramifications for Mildred, including massive backlash due to the popularity of Willoughby within the town; as well as deeply angering Officer Dixon, an poisonous & disgustingly racist cop who is a close friend of Willoughby's.

In terms of its actors, this film is an embarrassment of riches. When McDonagh was writing the script, there was only really one actress he could have chosen, as well as having wanted to work with Frances McDormand for many years. And it's no surprise to report that she dominates this film in every way you could imagine. I struggle to think of another character since Ellen Ripley who is not only tough-as-nails, but also unbelievably vulnerable & scared, whilst facing stratospheric odds against her from pretty much all directions.

But she is also ably supported by Sam Rockwell, as well as my own personal favourite of the film, Woody Harrelson. John Hawkes, Lucas Hedges & Peter Dinklage also provide memorable characters/performances.

As much as this film is well-scripted, for me, the biggest problem with it is the ending. Whilst I'm obviously not going to give anything away, it does to a certain extent affect the film for me as a whole. Because, literally, the film just suddenly ends. Randomly, in the middle of a scene, it finishes, making no sense & leaving you sitting there just thinking "Errrr, why did that just happen...?" And, in a film which has not misstepped in any way, this sticks out like a sore thumb.

But this is powerful & moving filmmaking, with massively impactful performances & a killer sense of humour. You certainly wouldn't ever want to piss Frances McDormand off...

Ben Wheatley continues his career as a filmmaker impossible to pin down to one particular genre. With his filmography full of very different & at times challenging themes, it is great that he is able to keep going in different directions. This latest effort is mixed, although when all is said and done, I have given it 4 stars as it is an interesting mix-up.

The story concerns a group of individuals who all meet up in a dingy warehouse at the fag-end of the 70's to conduct an arms deal. With mistrust thick in the air, the massive egos & trigger-happy fingers combust and the film descends into an epic shoot-out between the two parties. The film then ratchets up the stakes as the characters become increasingly desperate.

Far and away, the best part of this film is the characters/actors playing them. For me, my favourite was Sharlto Copley as the extremely enthusiastic & unstable Vernon. With his highly-strung accent and mannerisms, coupled with an instability that knows no bounds, he is massively watchable. Armie Hammer also does good work, as the super-smooth Ord.

The story does at times run out of steam, despite the efforts of both the actors & creative team. But I was never bored and did genuinely enjoy the journey. Mercifully, the short running time means the film does not outstay it's welcome.

I had seen The Armstrong and Miller show advertised on BBC so decided to give it a shot, especially after seeing one of the sketches of the pair as the WW2 pilots.

The selection of skits were OK, some funny, some not. Funnily enough, the best thing about the show was it's theme tune, which perfectly satirised several other comedy series's ones, including Ab Fab.

After Lock Stock, Guy Ritchie was the hottest thing in gangster films/exuberant cinema, his unconventional nonlinear style mixed with humour & amazing soundtracks entering into the cultural zeitgeist of the 90's. And, as with all these behemoths, there were plenty of people who looked at what he had achieved and wanted to jump onto the bandwagon/cash in to the newest & most exciting craze. And one partnership which managed to succeed in this, as well as managing to get one of the hottest casts at the time, was Dominic Anciano & Ray Burdis. Fresh off making a very well-received & successful debut called Final Cut, they were then given the budget to make Love Honour and Obey.

The plot, in the loosest sense of the word, imagines a London full of a group of people who sort-of know each other and a few of them who are involved with dodgy dealings/underworld schemes. Also, confusingly, most of the characters are also called the first names of the actors who portray them. So Johnny Lee-Miller plays Johnny, who is stuck in a dead-end job as a postman but who also is friends with Jude (Jude Law,) whose family are small-time gangsters, headed by Ray (Ray Winstone.) Johnny wants to become a part of the gang, but it all goes wrong.

This film wasn't even on my radar. The only reason I rented it was because I was chatting with a work colleague who was also into his films and he could not stop going on about it. I watched with a mate of mine and for 70% of the running time, it is an absolute riot to watch. It is genuinely funny, with great lines, soundtrack & situations that are equally as good, if not better, than anything Ritchie came up with in the same period. The cast themselves also had a great time shooting it, as you would do if you were paid to spend a few weeks hanging around with your mates being stupid & with a great script.

Unfortunately, and there is no reason for this to happen, the film then does something completely inexplicable which comes dangerously close to ruining it completely: it turns from a silly, happy-go-lucky caper into a really nasty, almost torture-porn film. The humour completely vanishes, and in its place are the same characters you have just spend the last hour having a laugh with, who are then put into a totally different film. And I can't overstate how much of a misfire this is. And this was probably the main reason why the film actually didn't get great reviews.

Funnily enough, for me the best comparison for how you will deal with this is the Christopher Nolan film Interstellar. Both of them are great films which then have terrible endings/final thirds. For some people, these narrative choices/decisions totally ruin the whole experience for them & they then dislike the films for that reason. For me though, both of these movies do so much right in the first two thirds that overall I can give them a free pass.

Whilst it is sad that Love Honour and Obey does lose its way towards the end, not for a second do I regret the journey leading up to that point. Full of laughs & genuinely funny.

Damien Chazelle has been an interesting & dynamic filmmaker. His works have looked at many different situations, although the element of perfectionism coupled with competition/high stakes has been a constant theme. At its best (La La Land,) he is a wonderful & powerful voice with a strong musical sensibility.

When it came to Babylon, the main reason I wanted to see it was, despite my liking for his previous work, actually a totally different reason. This film was advertised & billed as a totally uncensored, no-holds barred look at an extreme period in time. And then the awarding of its 18 rating confirmed this. However, as Babylon proves, Chazelle at his worst is scattershot & also not very good at making a compelling story, especially one 3 hours long, despite pretty much no limits being placed on him by the studios.

Babylon, in its most basic sense, looks at the journeys of multiple characters who are in 1920's Hollywood, showing their dreams, ambitions & failures. You have the up-and-coming starlet with big talent & herculean demons (Robbie,) the established film star who was massively successful but who's star is starting to wane (Pitt,) the young immigrant who is initially taken under Pitt's character's wing before surpassing him in terms of producing/directing (Calva) and an aspiring & talented musician making his way through musical pictures (Adepo.) Alongside this, there are also minor characters who the film attempts to follow and entwine in the story.

Writing that previous paragraph shows in many ways why, sadly, this film is almost a total misfire. In one sense, you have to admire its scope & determination to try to paint a large canvas looking at people of different colours and life experiences in the same situation. It opens with a nearly 30 minute orgy/party scene, full of great choreography & cinematography. But it just cannot keep that momentum going and despite spending a decent amount of time with the principle characters, you find yourself not caring & becoming bored.

It does have some good points & conversations, the most profound and hard hitting for me being, ironically for a film whose entire raison d'etre is total excess, a quiet but devastating conversation between Pitt's character & Elinor St. John, a veteran tabloid hack/gossip journalist about the trajectory that everyone in that time in Hollywood was going to experience in some way or another. There is also a wonderfully creepy cameo by a star from movies past, as the slimy, greasy & dispicible mob boss who one of the main characters gets caught up with.

There are also some profoundly sad & shocking moments, such as one of the characters having to visit a parent in a psychiatric hospital, the film perfectly capturing the juxtaposition of the immense success on the one hand, compared to the total destruction on the other, but also subtly showing just how messed up both of them are in their own different ways. There is also a toe-curlingly disgusting moment of racism towards one of the characters as well.

But those good/powerful points simply cannot outweigh the bad. The characters may have interesting moments, but they are also boring, vapid & fairly insignificant people in their own ways. You do find it hard to have much sympathy for their plights, some of which are totally self-inflicted, often repeatedly so. And this film is also unbelievably bloated in pretty much every way you can imagine.

I did want this film to be better, but this is another case of too much ambition meeting reality and crashing & burning. See it for a decent recreation of 20's Hollywood & not much else.

When Venom appeared in Spider-Man 3, it was almost universally accepted that of the 3 villains featured, he came off the worst. Although to be fair, no-one came out of that film unscathed, which was made worse by how incredible Spider-Man 2 was.

After a concerted effort over many years to bring Venom to the big screen in his own film, we finally got both a decent actor playing him and a hefty budget to match. However, Venom is a very strange movie. When you look at it purely as a film, it isn't that good. The performances & script are so scattershot in terms of their quality (Riz Ahmed literally stands in the shots & says his lines whilst trying to be intimidating, but wouldn't scare a toddler; Michelle Williams, whose ability to break your heart & touch your soul in films like Manchester By The Sea & Brokeback Mountain, is given a role so bland/badly written, you start to wonder if she's only there for the cheque,) that you would reasonably expect the film to fail. There is also terrible CGI/special effects and several uninspired directing/production decisions such as a bland soundtrack.

However, having said all of that, Venom also has a real ace up its sleeve which saves it from 1 star ignominy, at least in my review... it it totally off-the-wall, batsh*t crackers. And it did leave me with a smile on my face. Tom Hardy's physical comedy, for example, is actually really well played. Venom is portrayed in many ways as the relative from hell, except in this case, instead of minor petulant acts like stealing money or property, he eats people & destroys everything in his path. The arguments between Eddie Brock & Venom are also quite funny as well.

The other positive that this film has, which helps it in no uncertain terms, is it's length. Rather than making it a long, drawn-out origin story which tries to set up a million different elements in preparation for the sequels, this film is just a shade over 90 minutes. And it really zipped along for me, managing to be deceptively light-weight in terms of it's tone and silliness.

Also, despite its 15 rating, it was a real struggle to work out why this film had been given this. Despite the potential for it to be graphically violent, for me it was never more than a strong 12A film, despite a couple of moments of threat.

Whilst there was a lot more it could have done well, this is a solid 3 star film which, if you don't take it too seriously, you can have a laugh at. And amusingly enough, despite a change of director, the sequel is almost a carbon copy of this one in terms of its story and how it is shot, although it does have a great villain played by Woody Harrelson.

Based on the true investigations of DCI Colin Sutton, this looks at his handling of the murder of a young woman who was found fatally wounded in the middle of a London park.

The series is very detailed, looking at the different elements of the investigation as well as the horrific trauma suffered by not only the victims who survived, but also the families of the murdered women.

The cast are excellent. Martin Clunes plays Sutton as a deeply moral, committed & genuinely decent man who is horrified by what he is investigating and is determined to track down the perpetrator to get justice for those affected by these horrific crimes. Also, special mention must go to Celyn Jones as Levi Bellfield. His performance is so accurate, it's scary. His portrayal of Bellfield gets under your skin and stays there, haunting you and almost making you retch.

Both this and the 2nd series are excellent and both worth a watch, showing again how well ITV can make dramas.

I cannot for the life of me remember why I added this to my rental list. It was probably because it had received some good reviews, plus I have before discovered some absolute gems in terms of small scale foreign films which got almost no publicity but which were incredible (Holiday & Y tu mamá también immediately spring to mind.)

I put this film on & within 10 minutes started fidgeting. Despite some interesting & at times beautiful cinematography, very quickly I could see that we were going to spend a very large amount of time having long drawn out conversations with characters who I didn't care about, trying to inject suspense into a story which was boring.

I kept with it for a decent chunk of time, to see if it was able to spread its wings and take flight... it didn't. I then switched it off, forgot about it and it was only when prompted to write this review that I remembered parts of it. For some, it may be compelling, but for me it was just another film with high pretensions which had almost nothing to say.

Shot weeks after he wrapped on Call Me By Your Name, this was another chance for Timotheé Chalamet to show his range as an actor. And whilst he gives it his best shot, along with a great performance by Steve Carrell, unfortunately this is a relatively lightweight drama with not much substance. 

Based on a true story, Beautiful Boy looks at the life of Nic Sheff and his father David. Jumping backwards & forwards in time between Nic’s early years and then when he leaves home to go to university, it follows his descent into addiction, particularly crystal meth, as well as his father’s desperate attempts to try to help him. 

There is a very lovely & loving feel to the film, clearly showing that Nic grew up in a supportive environment, despite his parents splitting up when he was a small boy. Rather than be judgemental about the situation, it instead tries to in many ways be a fly on the wall, looking at the slow breakdown of both Nic & David’s lives. 

However, the simple truth for me was that underneath all this empathy, including some extremely poignant & beautiful scenes between the two of them, there wasn’t that much substance to the film. We simply watch as Nic goes down a spiral of addiction, then resorts to crime & petty theft to get a fix, before going back to his parents when things inevitably go wrong. Whilst I accept this is what happened, there needs to be a compelling film around this. 

But the performances are very good. Carrell adds another string to his already significant bow, playing a father literally at the end of his tether, trying to do everything he can to help his son whilst knowing it is a losing battle. Alongside psychopathy (Foxcatcher) and moral banker (The Big Short,) Carrell is able to really flex his dramatic chops with this role. Chalamet is also good, his ability to communicate the horror of the life he has found himself in perfectly complimenting the performance of Carrell. 

As much as I’d wanted to like this film more, it simply wasn’t that compelling & the script certainly could have done with more development. 

After the incredible Lone Survivor and Deepwater Horizon, Peter Berg & his co-star Mark Wahlberg continued their collaboration together, again looking to examine in a docu-drama style way a catastrophic event, as well as the actions of the many ordinary people caught up within it. And as a proud Bostonian, after the bombings which hit the marathon in 2013, there was really only one story to tell. Patriots Day looks at the lead-up to the bombing, then follows the aftermath, as well as the enormous collective effort to not only catch the bombers but also to rebuild the community in the wake of the tragedy.

When I first watched this film, I actually didn’t like it that much. I was in many ways expecting a continuation at the same massively high level of quality as the duo’s previous collaborations. And Patriots Day is not in that same league. One of the biggest issues, which in one way there wasn’t too much they could do about, was the fact that in this film Wahlberg is playing a composite character, as opposed to real individuals in the previous movies. And the fact that it is multiple people’s experiences shoe-horned into one character simply didn’t work. To quote one of the other reviews, the film is quite bitty & uneven.

Wahlberg’s Tommy Saunders is a rough & ready cop who is also a physical wreck. We meet him as he is taking part in a raid on a property. He is forced to police the Boston marathon event the next day, where the Tsarnaev brothers detonate two bombs, killing & maiming countless people. From there, Saunders becomes an integral part of the investigation at all stages, through to the capture of one of the brothers.

But despite my earlier criticism, this film benefits from being rewatched. And the second time I watched it, I actually really enjoyed it. Yes, the same issues are still there, but for me what shined through most was the massive effort to include & show how ordinary Bostonians were impacted & also came together. There is a sharp, sometimes caustic but also friendly humour that they have, which even extended to the police who were not shown as being universally popular in the film. 

Also, one of the other strings to particularly Berg’s bow is how good he is with action scenes. The tension & build-up, as you follow the brothers inching closer to carrying out the atrocity is unbearable at times. Berg also includes elements of footage from the day to devastating effect, the most prominent one for me being the genuine CCTV footage of one person’s escape. As the pursuit gains traction, you really find yourself buying into the world that the film has carefully been laying the foundations of. And whilst not all of it works, a decent amount of it does, which means there is a lot of enjoyment to be had.

For me, having seen the previous work & results that Berg, Wahlberg and their team can achieve, looking back on this film now, it would have actually made a stunning TV series, which meant that a lot of the events which had to be cut out in order to have a sensible running time could have been properly fleshed out. It is clear to me that the creative team care deeply about the events & people affected, which also importantly included extremely close collaboration with the Boston population, especially who live in the streets where the final scenes happen. 

So whilst there are some significant problems with this film, it is also a genuine attempt to honour the victims of this disgusting tragedy, showing the decency that the overwhelming majority of people in the world have, especially those who are part of a tight-knit community.