pforrest-2 Reviews

Leave the World Behind (2023)

Why bother?

[5/10 · 29 January 2024]

This movie really doesn't know what it wants to be. Is it a psychological thriller? Is it a disaster movie? Is it a wry comedy about the life of advantaged people? Is it a geopolitical allegory?

Honestly, it is none of these., Multiple stools and it falls between the lot of them.

There are two or three visually stunning scenes (the tanker, the leaflet plane), but the rest is frankly not very good. None of the characters convinces, the plot is by turns boring and ludicrous, and the characters' emotional process seems hard to believe.

It also falls down on believability time and again. Seriously, it'll probably be better if you don't bother to watch it.

I can't understand why the Obamas put their name to something whose main thrust seems to be to suggest that gun-owning and survivalism are the way to go - and/or having the money to build a beautifully-equipped armageddon bunker in your palatial house.

Saltburn (2023)

Poor, shallow, weak... derivative and ordinary.

[2/10 · 8 January 2024]

Honestly, how does such a dismal movie ever get funding? The most cliche'd plot, average acting, a lead character who manages to be a cross between the wonderful Stephen Graham and the appalling British politician Michael Portillo, a truly awful waste of a great actor in Carey Mulligan, and about four great lines in an average script. Totally unbelievable characters, shoddy dialogue, and a stupid storyline. Rosamund Pyke had the two best lines in the whole film and was sort of believable. Apart from that .... great locations... but maybe the money would have been better spent on something more substantial, like decent characterisation and plot.

Men (2022)

Great actors completely wasted in misogynist horror bore.

[4/10 · 7 February 2023]

Arguably the two most complete actors of their generations - the seriously wonderful Jessie Buckley and seriously wonderful Rory Kinnear - are utterly wasted in this awful film. The storyline is simply misogynistic. The end sequence (full of special FX) is laughably predictable.

It must have been fun for Rory Kinnear and the director to get him playing all the male characters apart from JB's violent, suicidal ex-husband, and it is quite fun to see him doing an Alec Guinness - but it would be more fitting in a more comedic film.

A complete waste of time and space, and a wicked, wicked waste of fantastic talent. I'm not sure Jessie Buckley will look back on this with any pride.

Stranger Things (2016–2025)

Oh dear. It started great... some top performances.... but it went downhill.

[6/10 · 2 September 2022]

I loved this to start with. Nice period detail (slightly suspect on the pop chronology, but nice soundtrack anyway). 11 (Millie Bobby Brown) was clearly going to be a huge star right from episode one (watching this just this month and not keeping up to date with the world of celebrity we had no idea she was already a superstar, but knew she would be). David Harbour as the cop was super too. Storylines good in series one. Series two less so, but OK. Series three.... blah blah blah just a bland teen American nothingness interspersed with generic horror tropes. OK, series four? Supposed to have regained form, but honestly, no. We gave up.

It's a Sin (2021)

Channel 4's wonderful AIDS mini-series will make you cry.

[9/10 · 30 April 2022]

At a time when the UK government is aiming to privatise Channel 4, for dubious reasons and against public opinion, I thought I should catch up with this, one of their principal offerings of the last two years. It is a blast. Great music, superb period detail, and a wonderful cast. Of course it is a tragic story overall, and if you don't shed a tear or two (in my case floods) I'll be surprised. But at the same time it is life-affirming. Hysterically funny in parts, full of warmth and love, it also doesn't shy away from the grim truths about some of the behaviour which helped HIV spread. This is what TV should be. All the cast, writers and production team should be so proud of what they achieved. Brilliant.

Anatomy of a Scandal (2022)

Good cast, well-photographed... but eventually a waste of time.

[3/10 · 28 April 2022]

Based on an extremely stupid mistake by a protagonist, and an extremely unlikely co-incidence, the plot gets more and more annoying as the series goes on. Plus.... the dialogue in the first couple of episodes is sharp, believable, witty but realistic. But then it goes downhill.

As others have said, the difference in appearance between one of the main characters in the present and how she was as a student is frankly baffling. And the weirdest thing of all - in one scene between the two women, the Siena character metamorphoses back to her student self, and the other character .... doesn't. It's as though they tried it, but the CGI just wasn't up to the job.

I wish I hadn't started watching this.

Boiling Point (I) (2021)

Stunning one-shot movie with superb acting.

[10/10 · 26 March 2022]

I was blown away by this wonderful movie. The naturalistic acting and dialogue were fantastic. I usually love Stephen Graham in every role, even (often!) unsympathetic ones. He was fantastic, but maybe even eclipsed by a magnificent performance by his assistant chef, played by Vinette Robinson. The entire cast were excellent. And although the basic feeling you walk away with is that it takes a special kind of person to work under this sort of pressure night after night - rather them than me - there are moments of lightness and empathy too. The technical challenges of the one-shot movie were handled superbly. Totally worthy of a raft of Oscars.

The Power of the Dog (2021)

#1 movie of the year in the Guardian newspaper? Give me a break.

[3/10 · 20 December 2021]

How a movie as slow-moving and frankly boring as this can still manage to be so unsubtle is beyond me. The motivation of the characters is generally unbelievable, the plot creaky in the extreme, and there are one or two moments of sheer bathos. There is an extraordinarily bizarre scene where the Cumberbatch character is hugging and man-handling a large fence post to absolutely no serious purpose; and the repetitive references to his hero Bronco start out being a shade annoying and end up being laughable. And as for his wearing chaps for practically the entire movie.... was Campion saying he likes them?

And what of the plot? Even the Guardian critic, rating it #1, describes the crucial mid-point of the film thus: "But then a strange turnaround takes place." - Strange? It's beyond belief. Far too many co-incidences in the plot are needed for the denouement to work - and most of them are sign-posted with a huge lack of subtlety. 'Oh look, there's an upside down dead cow.' 'Oh, that's anthrax - don't touch it.' I paraphrase, but the dialogue wasn't much better. Scenery 10/10, acting 7/10, cinematography 9/10, script and direction 4/10, plot 2/10... and yet somehow I ended up with a total score of 3/10, and that still seems about right. I guess I want to have some characters I can empathise with, and except for Kirsten Dunst early on, I didn't find one. Plus as someone else pointed out, there is a horrible scene where a horse is mistreated. Watching the movie I thought it must have been faked, because of laws against such cruelty - but if it was not, it is unacceptable.

One more thing..... you know that there is an issue with the plot of a movie when the director has to add a voice-over to the opening credits.

The Green Knight (2021)

OK, I'm never going to be a Guardian film reviewer

[3/10 · 19 December 2021]

(For anyone outside the UK, The Guardian is a UK liberal/intellectual newspaper.). Their film reviewer's top 50 of the year 2021 has The Green Knight at #2. (#1 is The Power of the Dog, which is an even more ridiculous choice.) The Green Knight starts wonderfully, with beautiful sets, striking looking characters (especially the women) and superb lighting. After the first 15 minutes, I felt this really had the serious potential for movie magic. Sadly, the rest was more and more disappointing. Muddled, unbelievable, with no emotional grab or philosophical power. Average script, unconvincing casting, and, to be honest, a pretty rubbish story. Whoever the writer was in the 14th century, I'm not sure he/she deserved the celebrity the poem received.

Maid (2021)

Glimpses of real life.... a Netflix novelty?

[9/10 · 3 November 2021]

Beautifully acted in general, brilliantly scripted, altogether an excellent series (still two episodes to go for me, but I needed to write something). Margaret Qualley is magnificent, and her relationship with her child (also a standout performance if three-year-olds can do performances rather than just be-ing) is wonderfully portrayed. A load of characters are wonderfully created and acted - Nick Robinson as Sean the abusive partner, Anika Rose as the woman who has everything except humanity, Tracy Vilar as the cleaning agency boss, B J Harrison as the caring refuge manager. I thought Andie MacDowell was a bit over the top..... but who am I to say? Thoroughly gripping stuff, anyway - and I have a suspicion that the tv series has actually improved on the original source material, given that our heroine's writing (she gets back into writing as the series progresses) is pretty average, and nowhere near as good as the dialogue in the series.

One thing... because some of the dialogue is quite naturalistic and in a foreign dialect for me as an old English person, we put the subtitles on. That works fine, but also shows that a lot of wonderfully atmospheric music has lyrics which are at best so-so and at worst complete piffle.

Much more important, the story is of a real person facing typical difficulties in life. I really liked the cash numbers which come up on screen as Alex spends her last few dollars, time and time again. Not everyone has the luxury of not worrying about a few dollars outgoings.

I'm so looking forward to catching the last two episodes, even though I'm not at all optimistic about the outcome. Congratulations to all involved.

Unorthodox (2020)

Does netflix do this to all stories it buys?

[6/10 · 10 April 2020]

On the whole I enjoyed Unorthodox. The story of a young woman who doesn't fit in to an orthodox Hasidic community in New York, and has to escape, is powerful, and all production values are high-class. The acting is uniformly excellent. So why did some of it seem not as compelling as other parts? The depiction of the community in New York is just superb. To an outsider it seems completely authentic. Everything rings true. Magnificent. But the sections of this four-part series set in the Berlin she escapes to seem far less real and believable. Why? I think the answer comes in the 'making of' section which you can watch after the final episode. It appears that they were mostly dreamed up by another mind, presumably at netflix' instigation. Once you know that, the difference between the stunning realism and power of the original story and the so-so Berlin sub-plots is completely explained. If I were the author I would have been grimacing through half of the Berlin scenes... but of course, being netflix, I'd have been grimacing all the way to the bank. I now want to read the original.

Wild Rose (2018)

Worth a watch for Jessie Buckley's bravura performance

[7/10 · 11 January 2020]

The main character is a foul-mouthed impulsive hard-drinking ex-con neglectful mother of two with delusions of making it big in Nashville. She somehow is also a sympathetic character, and is beautifully played by Jessie Buckley. You might need subtitles occasionally to catch the full Glaswegian abuse and humour she manages to spout out. Other standouts are her two little children - remarkable performances by both - and a pretty impressive bit of character acting by Julie Walters as her despairing mum - complete with what sounded a decent accent, if a Sassenach can judge that. As for the music and the plot.... it does the job but for me only occasionally hit the real emotional spot.

The Wife (I) (2017)

Well worth watching, if only for Close and Price

[7/10 · 15 March 2019]

Sometimes you go to the cinema and come out thinking 'why the hell did I waste 90 minutes watching that?'. This is not one of those occasions. It is definitely worth a watch, and yet.... it also shows how difficult it is to make a really great movie. The two leads are both excellent - presuming Price's accent was good enough (I have no idea) - and there were no weak links in the cast. The script does well to keep to period, and is unobtrusive - no bad thing. Price's repetition of the Joyce quote is beautifully done, particularly that little tiny pause where he wonders whether to claim it is his work in order to impress a pretty young woman. You get the impression it's a quote he has used time and again for that purpose. Price's character is allowed to have its good side - the scene where the couple get a phone-call from their daughter saying she has given birth is moving and delightful. And yet .... we don't get enough of a sense that Price's character is aware of his own failings and his wife's prowess (even if he is hiding it). And Close's character doesn't quite show the stresses and conflicts she would be feeling over the years. Instead there is a bit of a lurch into melodrama towards the end of the movie. Plus the end isn't perfectly handled. So... 7/10 in that insulting and simplistic scoring system .

The Handmaid's Tale (2017–2025)

Wonderful to start with but maybe the profit motive has taken over....

[7/10 · 7 October 2018]

You can't argue with the power of the original story, and first series, but I'm not convinced subsequent series aren't an attempt to cash in on success. I started watching the second series but have actually stopped. That doesn't mean I don't miss some of the continuing powerful aspects - Elizabeth Moss is always intensely watch-able, and in the Commander and Aunt Lydia we have two of the most loathsome characters ever created on the small screen. Aunt Lydia is especially hard to forget. The most evil of women, the scriptwriters loved her character so much they made her appear in so many situations we start to lose track of likelihood. She is in many ways the embodiment in Gilead of the Daleks in Dr Who. She pops up in all sorts of totally implausible situations, looks almost quaint and cute at times, and then lets everyone see the coldness of her heart and the little alien mind within. She even moves a bit like a Dalek, and often carries a Dalek-like electrical prod.

La La Land (2016)

Nice performances from the leads, and generally good fun.

[7/10 · 17 January 2017]

I had a bit of a dilemma at the cinema last week ... go and see Felicity Jones get ill and die in A Monster Calls, or go for some escapist nonsense instead. It was a grey miserable January day, so La La Land won. It was pretty enjoyable, too. Ryan Gosling did a great job of being, e, Ryan Gosling pianist / keyboard player (which is pretty cool in itself)... and Emma Stone was absolutely fantastic as his love interest. One of her audition scenes reminded me of the incredibly powerful audition Naomi Watts does in Mulholland Drive, and that might not be a co-incidence judging from La La Land's locations. Ultimately a musical is going to stand or fall on the quality of its songs, and I'm not sure these will pass the test of time... but the whole movie was well done and a good romantic night out - unless you go along with someone you are not totally sure you want to spend the rest of your life with.

A Monster Calls (2016)

Once they referenced Pan's Labyrinth it was always going to be a disappointment

[6/10 · 17 January 2017]

I had a bit of a dilemma at the cinema last week ... go and see Felicity Jones get ill and die in A Monster Calls, or go for some escapist nonsense instead. It was a grey miserable January day, so La La Land won. But I did catch A Monster Calls later, and, while I blubbed like a good proportion of the audience (and even - apparently - hardened critics), the overwhelming feeling was one of disappointment. Just because it has a Spanish director and elements of magic, it is futile to compare this film with Pan's Labyrinth. I felt the plot was one-dimensional, the tree special effects so-so, Liam Neeson's treated voice just plain annoying, and the script was average. Even the close-up watercolour graphics which were so beautiful at one stage never repeated that wonderful visual treat. The great Sigourney Weaver was horribly mis-cast and given a pretty awful script. The only actors who came out of this really well were Felicity Jones, who was affecting throughout and had emotional kick, and the young lead Lewis MacDougall who did everything with his face that the script didn't allow him to do with his words.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)

Worth seeing even for a non-megafan of Star Wars

[8/10 · 16 January 2017]

This is a pretty well-told adventure story, full of some great action. It avoids whimsy, and for the second time in a row features a strong (but still rather delightful) female lead. Last time it was the estimable Daisy Ridley; this time the even more estimable Felicity Jones. How on earth as an actor do you move from Stephen Hawking's long-suffering wife in academia to being an action hero (with the small matter of dying of cancer in A Monster Calls somewhere in the process)? She did it. She is clearly made of tougher stuff than her sweet diffident English appearance seems to show. Altogether this film demonstrates one of the reasons why movies need making - drama, excitement, action, and at the heart of it, a real person that can be identified with and/or admired.

A Street Cat Named Bob (2016)

A sweet feelgood movie without pretensions

[8/10 · 5 November 2016]

I bet this gets terrible reviews from the critics, because it has no ambitions except to tell (and embroider) a tale of real life (itself embroidered a little, OK...) . Anyway I just got home from seeing it, and it is no great work of art ... but it is a very enjoyable movie based more or less on a true story. If I had a criticism it would say cut the mouse (totally irrelevant to the film, but then I'm not a cat). If I wanted to heap praises I would say that Luke Treadaway does the main human role fantastically, Bob is pretty impeccable except for the dubbing, and Rute Gedmintas is incredibly lovely as the (fictitious?) love interest. If only Luke & Ruta could have ridden off into the Islington sunset together .... they seemed made for each other.

The Night Manager (2016–2025)

Pretty much Bond without the chases .... what was the fuss about?

[5/10 · 25 June 2016]

A succession of cardboard characters, too much fawning on the luxury life-style, and some strange casting .... what is there here to justify the rave reviews? I watched this via the box set, two episodes a night, expecting great things after the hype it received, and was very disappointed. Average dialogue, predictable characterisation, dubious plot, and occasionally ludicrous scenes such as the arms sales display. Mis-cast? Yes: Olivia Colman, Tom Hollander and Russell Tovey were all wrong for their parts - and even the estimable Tom Hiddleston didn't really convince - his elfin smile at times didn't fit at all with the character. Six episodes was really too much for what was honestly just a Bond-style story, and there were too many holes in the plot to convince. (How late in pregnancy are people allowed to fly, for one?) The one bright moment for me was the description of Hiddleston's changing responses to Sophie as 'the changing of the guard'. Perfectly well shot and directed, lavish use of locations ... but .... I honestly don't know how the rave reviews happened.

Dag (2010–2015)

Delightfully black comedy!

[10/10 · 6 February 2016]

I don't honestly know how Sky Arts managed to shoe-horn this into the endless Andre Rieu concert schedule (the schedule that has finally made me decide to do away with Sky for good), but it was a great find. Great to listen to, great to watch - sometimes moving, sometimes Twin Peaks-like in its weirdness, and often laugh-out-loud funny. My one reservation is that the male characters (though all charismatic in their own ways) are almost without exception overweight and not typically good-looking, in stark contrast to the female characters, who are mostly drop-dead gorgeous, in good shape - and considerably younger than the male leads. Not to mention that in Nuva Novotny you have one of the most delightful female actors of all time. But it's a beautifully written, shot, acted and directed series, thoroughly recommended.

Berberian Sound Studio (2012)

Seriously awful - and not in a good sense

[2/10 · 17 December 2013]

I was so looking forward to this movie. The subject matter looked appealing, and the setting and storyline interesting. As a sound recording buff with an interest in vintage gear it looked ideal. What I got was a mishmash - competent direction, decent acting, decent cinematography, coupled with completely hopeless plot and editing. It's one of those films that starts promisingly and just goes down and down. The nature documentary clip which suddenly intrudes towards the end is one of the worst pieces of poor editing and plot illogicality I've ever seen. I recorded this from TV, and seriously thought the tuner had glitched onto another channel for five minutes. Repetitive lazy editing, cheating scary bits, just totally disappointing. I really don't think you can justify crappy bits by implying that you are paying homage to a genre which used to have crappy bits.. unless you're making a pastiche. Judging by the awards I see this has won your mileage may vary. Now to look at some reviews to see what subtlety and greatness I missed.

A Serious Man (2009)

An absolutely wonderful movie!

[10/10 · 27 June 2011]

Fantastic entertainment, but much more than that. Wonderful acting by a generally not A-list cast; superb directing, perfect cutting, witty script, great camera-work and lighting. This is seriously one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. It looks at the ridiculousness of religion with love and warmth. Brilliant. If the Coen brothers had made no other movie they would have fulfilled their destiny with this one. I thought Fargo was wonderful, but this is even better. It is seriously almost faultless. Impossible to pick out that stars in this, except to say that everyone involved should be totally proud of their achievement. Great film-making.

Shutter Island (2010)

Appalling nonsense.

[2/10 · 4 March 2011]

I had the misfortune of seeing this movie the night after seeing Johnny Kervorkian's 'The Disappeared'. That movie is a bit slow-moving, but has strong performances and at the end of it I felt I had passed a really worthwhile evening watching it. Shutter Island, in contrast, was a pile of excrement. Great locations, an A-list cast, big budget everything.... but a contrived and totally worthless story. Absolutely insulting to the people who died in concentration camps. At some stage in the second half Sir Ben Kingsley utters a long fatuous line about the whole story being an ultra-elaborate attempt to get the lead character to connect back with reality, and I flipped, and stormed out. Maybe I'm crazy, but this was crap.

Breaking the Waves (1996)

A truly great movie

[10/10 · 13 December 2010]

Some of the best acting you could ever wish to see. Emily Watson's performance is staggeringly good. Wonderfully real scenes, a rare case of hand-held camera working all the time, a gritty story about real people, with powerful ethical religious and moral undertones. Just a fantastic film, with possibly the best acting performance of all time. Frances McDormand was magnificent in Fargo, Kristin Scott-Thomas was pretty damn good in The English Patient, Brenda Blethyn was wonderful in Secrets and Lies...... and they all had the misfortune of hitting a year when Emily Watson did this. Is there a better performance by a single actor in any movie ever?

Wallander (2005–2013)

Disappointing!

[5/10 · 11 December 2010]

I'd heard so many good things, but when I finally got to see an episode, it was average. Not believable plot; cinematography that started great and then got average, and despite some pretty solid acting from the main characters, I couldn't even be arsed to sit through the two hours and ten minutes. Cardboard villains, silly dramatic set-ups, and really no better than a typical Brit or American offering - just a damn sight longer. And how does a car explosion as the hero is walking away from it blast the hero back at a 45 degree angle towards the explosion? And how do two cops who realise they need to get out of a car s l o w l y because of a potential hazard then slam the doors? Seriously disappointing.