Given the brilliantly diverse selection of Best Picture nominees this year, it feels like we need to talk about tokenism. Because it it just me or is there always at least one true story of a white American man struggling, often in wartime, against some group of Others, and it feels like they get a token slot regardless of merit. Now sometimes, these are pretty good like Bridge of Spies or Captain Phillips. But sometimes you get American Sniper. Or this year, Hacksaw Ridge. Now to be fair, Hacksaw Ridge is superior to American Sniper and it is a bit less racist. But the film is based on a truly amazing story that really deserved a better telling. It has its moments, and Vince Vaughan does a surprisingly effective turn as a drill sergeant. Andrew Garfield does a pretty good job but not enough to overcome the film's shortcomings. It's trying to be too many films at once, and I could have done without the ridiculously cheesy and cringe-worthy attempt at a sweeping epic romance. I'm still not sure I really liked Hugo Weaving's performance and given how the long the film was, it could have cut down the sections with his parents as it started to feel like I was being hit over the head with them (having said that, why does his brother just disappear from the film midway through?). But my biggest problem is with the battle at Hacksaw Ridge itself. The Walking Dead likes its guts and gore, but it also knows that to be effective, you need to use them in short, shocking bursts, otherwise the impact doesn't land. But Hacksaw Ridge gives us what feels like 40 minutes of unrelenting and over the top gory violence which just completely disengaged me with the horror it was trying to portray. But the biggest missed opportunity in what should have been the apex of the film - Desmond Doss's long post-battle vigil as he finds badly wounded colleague after colleague, rescuing and caring for them in an incredible act of compassion and bravery, driven by firm religious conviction. The scene stars fairly effectively, until an awful, cloying, stirring Hollywood score interrupts it with completely the wrong emotional tone and totally undermines the power it could otherwise have. Hacksaw Ridge won't won Best Picture. It doesn't deserve to be on the same list as these other films.
I'd probably put Lion and Hell or High Water on a slight lower scale than the other six contenders. They're both really good films but didn't quite have the same impact on me.
Lion is another fascinating story that could maybe have been told even better. The first half with the young Saroo is particularly brilliant, affecting and terrifying in equal measure. Not only is young Sunny Pawar utterly fantastic as the young Saroo, he's surrounded by a fantastic supporting case in this section who make a big impact with a tiny number of scenes. Dev Patel and Nicole Kidman are also excellent in the second half, but the film drifts a little. Perhaps it's because of the quite disruptive jump forward 20 years. Perhaps because the story isn't quite told how I expected, seeming to overly wallow in Saroo's guilty feelings and the impact on his not-so-interesting relationship with his girlfiend rather than engage more with the process of searching for his family. It is only in the final few scenes when older Saroo seems more connected to the younger Saroo that we were so connected to. A film that was nearly there, but a bit of a missed opportunity.
Hell or High Water was another film that I did genuinely like, but which I didn't fully connect with, possibly because of its slightly off-putting unrelenting maleness or perhaps because it felt a little old-fashioned and like something that's been done before. Having said that, it is a very well-made, well-acted film, particularly by Jeff Bridges, and the story doesn't go exactly where you're expecting (although it doesn't feel that fresh either). It looks stunning, and is directed and edited very effectively. It's one of those films that in isolation, I admired and enjoyed, but just couldn't quite understand why other people were quite so enthusiastic about it, to the point that I probably remember it slightly less fondly than I experienced it at the time.
But that still leaves us with six, brilliant, unique and different films, any one of which I would be happy to see win Best Picture. And because I refuse to rank them or pick a favourite, I'm just going to write about them in alphabetical order.
Arrival is a terrific piece of grown-up, intelligent sci-fi, centred round a brilliant performance by Amy Adams. It is beautiful to look at, with stunningly expansive cinematography and the most incredible sound and score. The story unfolds like a puzzle, in fact like the linguistic puzzle that the central character must solve. It starts dreamily and then builds and builds momentum towards a dizzying rush of emotion and story resolution. It doesn't talk down to the audience, letting each person watching get to the ultimate revelation in their own time. The moment I realised what was actually happening was such an emotional punch to the gut and I was in tears. Without preaching or over-egging its message, it says a range of things and leaves you with as many questions or answers. Arrival is a film that should probably be more in the mix for Best Picture than it has been.
Although Fences has been criticised for being too stagey (which is not totally unfair, a couple of moments don't quite work and some of the editing does give the odd scene the feeling of filmed theatre) it is a film whose excellent script and quite phenomenal acting more than overcomes any shortcomings. Quite simply, I cannot think of a better pair of performances than those given by Viola Davis and Denzel Washington. They are utter perfection. The film is endlessly interesting and moving. It's not easy and it defies you to sympathise with Troy but demands you understand him. I could go on for pages about the clever way it shows the effect of the insidious poison drip-drip of racism on the lives of Troy and his family. It is not just racism that has caused Troy to be the way he is, but it is a constantly lurking shadow, alongside Troy's inability to live up to the moral code he sets for himself and the world. The tension can be unbearable as you do not know where the next splinter of Troy's anger will land. The twisting and twisted effect it has wife Rose is emotionally devastating. Perhaps the film does not do a huge amount that seeing a filmed version of the play could have done, but it is nonetheless a compelling watch.
Hidden Figures is a total joy of a film. It may not be the most subtle or originally told film, but it takes its story and characters and just runs with it in a way that means the audience can't help but be swept along. The three central performances are universally great and wonderfully distinct, each actor holding her own and complementing the others' performances perfectly. I really appreciated that it didn't make the racism and sexism that all three encountered subtle but instead blatant and in the foreground. It felt like the film was giving the ridiculous barriers they faced the massive eye-roll that they deserve. That is not to say it doesn't show the more subtle, less easy to fight against racism and sexism too. It manages to be a film showing its time but utterly of ours and it's told in a way that appreciates that a fantastic story, smartly told and joyously acted can inform, entertain and inspire like little else in film.
I'm not sure there's much I can say about La La Land that hasn't already been said a million times (have many films been talked about this much around an Oscar season? There's been hype, backlash, backlash-against-the-backlash and I think we might now be into backlash-against-the-backlash-against-the-backlash). I've seen it twice, and although I noticed a small number of flaws the second time, it still left me with a grin on my face, a song in my head and joy in my heart both times. When done right, there can be little more enjoyable than a move about the joy of the movies. Emma Stone is just brilliant in it and the first two song and dance numbers, and the late montage, are particularly wonderful. Who can tell if it will stand the test of time, and perhaps it doesn't quite live up to the films it clearly loves, but for sheer cinematic delight, it ticks all the boxes.
Manchester-by-the-Sea managed to be both funnier and sadder than I was expecting, perhaps sadder than I could have ever expected without ever being depressing. It's grounded in a brilliant script by Kenneth Lonergan and illuminated by terrific performances, particularly of course by Casey Affleck. It is so hard to speak about without revealing a central plot point which I will try to skirt around. What it does is be a film about a community that is not like my own particularly, dealing with circumstances beyond most of our experiences yet manages to be utterly relatable and incredibly moving. It absolutely worms into your heart and refuses to move, and I couldn't get it out of my head for days.
Finally, Moonlight, which is probably going to be the one of this year's crops that is most remembered. It is a beautiful and technically brilliant film, with an amazing all-round cast, none of whom gets much screen time but who all stay in the memory. I perhaps didn't emotionally engage with it quite as much as many people (not that I didn't find it very moving) because I was so aware of its technical brilliance, meaning I couldn't quite turn that part of my brain off and slip totally into the film, but that was definitely my problem and not the films - I suspect if I catch it on telly in a couple of years unexpectedly I will get completely hooked and devastated. The technical brilliance is mostly in the cinematography (though a big shout out to the music and sound) which communicates to us so much of Chiron's emotions and feelings when he cannot himself articulate them. The camera moves from watchful, to frantic, to afraid, to contemplative and shows every little layer of identity that Chrion builds as he moves through his life. Mahershala Ali and Naomie Harris are particularly brilliant, but so are all three actors who play Chiron. It is a character study like few others, and a film of a visual beauty that few others reach too.
No comments:
Post a Comment