Emlyn's top 10 films of 2016

There’s been a lot of ink spilled about 2016 being a terrible year for films, but that’s really not the case. Sure, it’s been a fairly crummy year in a lot of respects, and the big studio movies have by and large been fairly forgettable, but for smaller titles it’s been a great year – and there’s even been the odd really good blockbuster as well. So without further ado, let’s get to it: in no particular order, my ten favourite films of 2016.

BONE TOMAHAWK 

Forget about THE HATEFUL EIGHT – this was the best Western starring Kurt Russell and his magnificent moustache released this year. A compellingly weird genre blend of old-fashioned oater and cannibalistic horror, it certainly stick in the memory. The first two acts play out much like THE SEARCHERS, with a quartet of cowboys and gunslingers trading some of the year’s best dialogue as they pursue their cannibal quarry. And then the final act slams a hard left into truly gruesome, terrifying horror in the vein of THE HILLS HAVE EYES as our characters realise just how badly outmatched they are. It’s terrific stuff, and has the best kill of the year too.

THE NICE GUYS

Shane Black’s back with one of the funniest films of the year, teaming up a hard-boiled Russell Crowe and a delightfully slapstick Ryan Gosling as they try to solve a mystery involving a dead porn star, a missing girl and something to do with the automobile industry in ‘70s LA. Gosling is a revelation here with a real gift for inspired idiocy, and while it’s perhaps not as good as KISS KISS BANG BANG, it’s always a treat to have another Shane Black buddy cop movie. Sequel, please. 

HELL OR HIGH WATER

Another Western, but this time a modern one as two down-on-their-luck brothers rob the bank that’s about to foreclose on their land so they can pay it back with its own money. Genuinely nail-biting and constantly surprising, it has Chris Pine’s best performance to date and a welcome return to Rooster Cogburn mode from Jeff Bridges as the surprisingly sympathetic antagonist. Besides, the real baddie here is capitalism, as we see how the banks have laid waste to rural Texas, driving ordinary people to desperate measures in order to survive. In the circumstances, it’s hard not to want the brothers to succeed in ripping off the bank that’s ripped off so many before now.

I, DANIEL BLAKE

Ken Loach came back out of retirement to make this, and that goodness he did: it’s a searing, devastating indictment of the current Conservative government’s austerity policies and the endless, unthinking cruelty that people endure at its hands. It’ll make you ashamed to be British and want to immediately volunteer at your local food bank. An achingly honest, almost unbearably moving film which is as simple as it is potent, it’s the most important British film of the year by a long way and should be required viewing for employees of the DWP. 

MOANA

Disney has had a stunning year, and their animation department is no exception. On top of being a refreshingly unique and effortlessly charming tale inspired by the mythology of the Pacific Islands, a setting we see far too little of in our cinemas, MOANA is spectacularly beautiful and has a soundtrack to die for courtesy of Lin-Manuel Miranda and Opetaia Foa’i. My only complaint is that I would’ve liked more songs in the native languages of the Pacific rather than English, but it feels churlish to complain too much in the face of how purely enjoyable this movie is. And who knew The Rock could sing this well?  

LA LA LAND

What is there to say about this one that hasn’t already been said? A simultaneously life-affirming and heartbreaking musical romance, it confirms that director Damien Chazelle is the real deal if there were any doubt after WHIPLASH, features career-best work from Ryan Gosling (him again) and Emma Stone, and is likely to have you dancing in the aisles from the very first musical number. But where Another Day Of Sun managed to plaster a big stupid grin on this non-fan of musicals, Emma Stone’s climactic Audition and the overwhelming finale will rip the still-beating heart out of your chest and stamp on it for good measure. It’s been a long time since a film made me cry this much.

SILENCE

Every Scorsese movie is special, but a nearly 30-year passion project of his is truly something to savour. Epic in scope but also hugely personal, it’s a film that expects a lot from its audience but has rich rewards for those who put the work in. It’s an inquiry into the nature of faith, the unspoken arrogance of missionary work and the dangers of cultural imperialism that should prove enormously satisfying even for non-believers. At nearly three hours it’s not an easy watch, but it’s one of the most thematically dense and thought-provoking films I’ve seen in some time. I can’t wait to see it again. 

ARRIVAL

One of the best true SF films in years, ARRIVAL is one that we’ll probably be talking about in the same terms as CLOSE ENCOUNTERS or BLADE RUNNER in 20 years’ time. How great is it to see an alien invasion film where the priority is to communicate with them rather than kill them all? A paean to the best of the human spirit and a desperate call for cooperation in a world that seems to be more divided by the day, this is truly a film of its moment in time and might help restore some faith in humanity after this disastrous year. Before seeing this, I was deeply sceptical of any attempt at a sequel to BLADE RUNNER. But with Denis Villeneuve at the helm, now I say bring it on. Can he do DUNE next? 

THE HANDMAIDEN

This one’s a bit of a cheat as it’s not out in the UK until April, but it’s my list and I make the rules. The best film of the 2016 London Film Festival for my money, it’s a period drama heist movie set in Japan-occupied 1930s Korea with two lesbian protagonists, from the director of Oldboy. What’s not to like about that? Another one that will reward repeat viewings, the sheer number of twists and rug-pulls in its storytelling beggars belief – the plotting alone is a huge achievement. But it’s also a fascinating period piece set in an era of history most people in the West will know little about, and a very sweet, surprisingly funny love story about two women taking the fight to their male oppressors and actually making quite a good go of it. I think it would be a very good date movie.

ROGUE ONE

What can I say? I’m not sure I’m physically capable of disliking a film where a Rebel ship pushes one Star Destroyer into another, smashing them both to smithereens in the process. Add to that a brief, glorious glimpse of what a STAR WARS horror movie might look like and a story about ordinary people choosing to give everything they have to a cause more important than any individual, and you have a great space opera movie which takes this venerable franchise to previously unseen, very exciting places. As much as I love the Skywalkers, I also loved seeing the normal people of this universe, and what they do when there’s no Chosen One to save the day.

But seriously, that space battle was an all-timer, wasn’t it?  

Image: The Handmaiden 

Make Space Opera Relevant Again

What a depressing week, in what a depressing year, this has been. After many years of what had seemed like genuine, positive progress towards fairer treatment for everyone and increased acceptance of people different from ourselves, the Brexit vote and now the election of President Trump have dragged us right back again. Hopefully it’s just a case of two steps forward, one step back, but who knows at this point. We’ve an ugly few years ahead of us, and things are almost certain to get worse before they get better.

But it’s often been said that the best art is produced in times like these, and times like these can reveal new ways of looking at the art we already have. This often especially applies to science fiction; I’ve written before that Dune, a novel that was timely in 1965, seems almost prophetic 50 years later, and two of 2016’s biggest science fiction films, both new properties in venerable franchises  – Star Trek Beyond and the clunkingly named Rogue One: A Star Wars Story -  have been granted a relevance by this year’s turbulent politics that they might not otherwise have had.

Star Trek took me very much by surprise when it came out. Into Darkness was a disappointment, I think we can all agree, that aimed for political commentary in the vein of the classic series but largely bungled it with a needlessly complicated story and a “twist” that didn’t make sense in the context of the rebooted series. Beyond, by contrast, is refreshingly simple and straightforward; just another mission in the life of the Enterprise that plays like an extended episode of the first TV show - and that’s meant as a compliment.

If that were all it had going for it, it would still have been a solid, entertaining space opera movie, but where it shocked me was with its politics. Not that they were in themselves surprising, given Trek’s long, proud history of looking forward to a utopian future where infinite diversity in infinite combinations exists peacefully and in prosperity, but in how it seemed to be commenting on Brexit, which had only occurred a month before release.

Without wishing to spoil, as surprisingly few people actually went to see it, Kirk, Spock, Bones and company find themselves up against a militaristic alien called Kraal, who wants to dismantle the Federation, bring back an idealised past that never really existed, and make competition and conflict, rather than cooperation, the driving forces behind civilisation in the galaxy. Needless to say, the Enterprise crew’s vision of unity wins out and Kraal is ultimately defeated, but it’s very interesting to note how comparable much of Kraal’s rhetoric is to that which has been bandied about so much this year. It’s easy to imagine him calling on his followers to “make the Federation great again”. Beyond is a film calling for friendship between disparate peoples and a world where the strong don’t exploit the weak, and it could hardly have come at a better time.

In an era when hateful, racist demagoguery has dominated so much of the discourse, it’s gratifying to see a film where everyone, regardless of skin colour, sexuality or indeed species, is working together to build a better future rather than drag civilisation back into an imagined past. As screenwriter Simon Pegg said when I interviewed him, much of the appeal of Trek is that it represents a future where humanity makes it, where intelligence and communication is considered valuable, and where angry playground bullies like Donald Trump don’t win.

Rogue One, on the other hand, isn’t quite as hopeful a vision. Granted, Star Wars isn’t SF in the way Trek is, and it’s not trying to predict our future – it is a long time ago, after all. But after Tuesday, a world where evil has won and everything seems hopeless is rather of the moment. It’s hard to believe such a transparently racist, sexist, callous, intolerant excuse for a human being was voted for by millions of Americans, but it certainly makes the election of Palpatine in the prequels much more plausible. At least he was smart enough to pretend he wasn’t evil.

But regardless, a film where a tiny, seemingly insignificant rebellion armed with little more that hope stands up to an autocratic regime against all the odds is perhaps one we need right now. And especially when the tip of the spear consists of Felicity Jones, Donnie Yen, Riz Ahmed, Forest Whitaker and Diego Luna. It’s an admirably diverse cast, long overdue for Star Wars, and in a world where the racist rhetoric of the Right looks to paint everyone different from themselves as an Other to be feared and mistrusted, it’s exactly the tonic we need. As long as the movie’s good, at least – this is all speculation and I could be completely wrong.

Obviously, it’s practically impossible that these direct parallels were intentional. Films like these take a long time to make, which tends to restrict their ability to be topical. But good SF has a tendency to remain relevant far beyond its initial context, and frequently picks up new relevance as history moves on. Genre fiction has a unique ability to look at the world through its own lens, and oddly,  this distancing effect frequently helps it to age better than other fiction.  And so it is that, bizarrely, the horrible events of 2016 have granted these films an ability to speak to us in a way their creators surely couldn’t have intended.

I’m not entirely sure where I’m going with this, if I’m honest, and I’m still slightly in shock from the last week. It’s a bleak period of history we’ve found ourselves in, and it can seem like the constant push for progress in our politics is a futile struggle. But life imitates art, and if we take nothing else from the two biggest, most popular science fiction franchises in the world, it’s that Empires fall, Rebellions win - and Federations endure.


Image: Chris Weitz via Twitter 

Review: Park Chan-wook's THE HANDMAIDEN

Park Chan-wook’s new film, The Handmaiden, starts out feeling very unlike what you’d expect from the mind that brought us the twisted delights of Oldboy. For much of the first half, you think you know where things are going, and the weirdness that characterises so much of his work is strangely absent. But then he pulls the rug out from under you, that palpable strangeness starts seeping in like spilled ink soaking through a sheaf of paper, and we’re firmly back in the territory of Choi Min-sik eating a live octopus.

I started out almost wondering if he’d actually decided to make a simple costume drama – more fool me, I know. The titular handmaiden is Sookee, a pickpocket who’s been installed as the Lady Hideko’s servant to help her boss, posing as the Japanese “Count Fujiwara”, to seduce her and claim her inheritance. But Hideko’s weird, perverted uncle has designs on her for the same reasons, and they need to get her away from him.

As it happens, Sookee and Hideko end up falling for each other, leading to the sex scene that’s been providing the film with a great deal of press coverage. You’d think this sort of thing wouldn’t be too shocking in a post-Blue Is The Warmest Colour world, but here we are. Park has said that making this kind of film without sex scenes would be like making a war movie with no battles in it, and I have to say I agree. It’s certainly not the only way to convey the powerful attraction between these two women, but it is one of the most effective.

Obviously these scenes are a culmination to which there’s a lot of buildup, notably a scene where Sookee files down a sharp tooth of Hideko’s, which throbs with tension and suppressed longing. But the film’s too smart for simple titillation, and without wishing to give anything away, it definitely passes judgment on anyone who’s only turned up for the sex scenes. It’s trying to have its cake and eat it too, critiquing these scenes while also offering them up for the audience’s enjoyment, and it just about pulls it off.

But there’s much more going on here besides this. There’s the fascinating historical context of the Japanese occupation of Korea and the clash between two cultures, and the conflicts between men and women in this oppressive, patriarchal society where husbands treat their wives as little more than disposable amusements. Hardly anyone likes each other in this film and there seem to be half a dozen different schemes going on at any one time, and the tricksy, puzzle box plotting and angry, embittered characters are very much in Park’s wheelhouse.

Unsurprisingly, revenge is a central theme, but it’s noticeably less hopeless and futile here than in Park’s Vengeance trilogy. Perhaps because the cause here is actually a very just one, and the characters deserve to achieve it more than, say, Oh Dae-su. It’s certainly less gory and nasty than Oldboy, with even the one torture scene towards the end not being especially hard to watch, and despite moments of despair, it’s actually a remarkably optimistic film overall. It’s hardly happy all the time, but there are moments of genuinely rousing triumph here which I’m not used to in Park’s work. His victories are usually Pyrrhic at best.

So should you see it? It’s a new Park Chan-wook film, of course you should. He’s a master of his craft and he’s on great form here, delivering a gorgeous, richly textured movie which will doubtless inspire lengthy discussions in the pub afterwards. It’s a gripping story, expertly told and with an awful lot on its mind. It’s a pity I can’t say more for fear of spoiling its surprises, but it’s another exceptional work from a genius director. Is it better than Oldboy? Hard to say, not least because it’s fundamentally different in the best way. Park’s still pushing his boundaries, and we’re all better off for it.

Batman v Superman: Dissection of Justice

The DC Cinematic Universe is now officially on the move, beginning Warner Bros' attempt to catch up with their rivals at Marvel and leverage their vast catalogue of comic-book heroes into a multimillion-dollar multimedia empire. Batman v Superman brings together the two most iconic superheroes on the planet in a battle for supremacy... and falls flat on its face as soon as it leaves the gate. It is not a promising start for this brave new world.

This isn't going to be a conventional review, as much as it is an examination of all the areas that this film went wrong - at least in my opinion. Your mileage, of course, may vary.

But before we start digging around in this movie's guts, a few words on what I did like. Ben Affleck is a good Batman, and Wonder Woman steals pretty much every scene she's in; it's a pity she only has about 15 minutes of screen time. The action is mostly very good, and the final battle is actually quite spectacular - there's no denying that it's extremely cool to see the Trinity team up to fight Doomsday, as rubbish a character as he is. Sadly, the finale is also where the film's fatal flaws become most obviously apparent.

Not unlike Iron Man 2, the main problem here is that far too much time is spent laying the groundwork for the inevitable Justice League film instead of focusing on the story they're trying to tell here. The clue's in the title: it's trying to be a story about Batman fighting Superman as well as a prelude to the Justice League, and as a result it's cluttered, overly busy and a bit directionless. There are a bunch of cameos from the Flash, Cyborg and Aquaman that serve no purpose in this narrative, and an utterly baffling nightmare / vision of a dark future that serves only to confound and confuse.

The final battle, as great as it is, has the effect of making the preceding two hours of film seem almost completely irrelevant. The conflict between Batman and Superman gets wrapped up quickly and perfunctorily, and then they're off to beat up Doomsday. It takes no time at all for them to become friends, which makes almost the whole film seem like one giant act of misdirection. Which may have been deliberate, but all it does is make you wish they'd skipped this instalment and just jumped straight into Justice League, because it's much more entertaining watching these characters work together than fight each other. Honestly, the Trinity united is awesome, and it's such a shame that it takes so long to get to that point. It's not helped by the big Batman v Superman fight being curiously dull and unengaging.

There are two reasons why I haven't really discussed the first two thirds of the film. The first is because, as I've said, they basically don't matter in light of the ending. The second is that they're so cluttered and convoluted as to make Age of Ultron look like the Platonic ideal of narrative efficiency by comparison. It doesn't help the titular fight's sense of irrelevance that it's founded on misunderstanding and manipulation instead of any real ideological conflict, and the ways they're manipulated into fighting are far too Byzantine and labyrinthine to be worth getting into here. Suffice to say, it's Lex's fault. Spoiler warning!

This is actually the part where we do get into serious spoiler territory, so if you want to see what few surprises this film has in store without knowing them in advance, look away now. Come back soon, because this stuff's pretty juicy.

Sticking with the Batman v Superman conflict and how pointless it is: the way it gets resolved truly has to be seen to be believed. It is laughable, pathetically poorly written, and makes it all the more obvious that the two halves of the film's title don't gel together at all. In brief: Superman is down for the count from Kryptonite poisoning, and Batman is on the brink of murdering him in the face with a Kryptonite spear.

(Batman kills a lot of people in this film. Loads of them. He's practically a serial killer.)

Before he's stabbed, Superman blurts out his mother's name, Martha, because she's been kidnapped by Lex and is being used as leverage to make him fight Batman. At which point, Batman loses his fucking mind and starts screaming "WHY DID YOU SAY THAT NAME?! WHO'S MARTHA?!" in his patented growly voice, because his mother was called Martha too. He then puts down the spear and they become friends. Let that sink in: he went to war against an indestructible alien who obliterated a city and was partially responsible for the deaths of thousands, and he called a truce because their mums have the same name. It beggars belief.

Even more hilariously, Batman then goes on to rescue Martha Kent and introduces himself as "a friend of your son's". To reiterate: not ten minutes ago he was about to stab Superman in the face with a Kryptonite spear. Friendship is cheap when you're the Batman, apparently!

There are any number of other problems as well. The villains are extremely weak: Jesse Eisenberg as Lex actually isn't as bad as I feared, but his motivation is practically nonexistent; and Doomsday is crap, has always been crap and will always be crap. The film goes to great lengths to make it clear that they're fighting in uninhabited areas, but the heroes decide to bring Doomsday back to the city anyway, presumably because it's not a proper fight without at least some civilian casualties. Most of the film involves very little happening at great length, and some of the dialogue is truly atrocious, like Lex declaring that it's "Fight night!" He might as well have gone all the way and yelled "Llllllllllet's get ready to ruuuuuumblllllllllle!"

Narrative illogic abounds: Batman, the World's Greatest Detective, has seemingly done shockingly little research into Superman's motives, and apparently doesn't watch the news, blaming Superman for a bomb blast which he clearly wasn't responsible for. And to return to that dream sequence: it can't be a dream because Bruce has no way of knowing that Darkseid Is; but if it's a vision of the future, why has Superman apparently teamed up with Darkseid? Or did they just not think this through? Also, why is Future Flash's costume so awful?

I feel like I've dwelt on the final act too much, but honestly, vast swathes of this film have just blurred together in my memory. It's only in the final third that anything interesting happens, while paradoxically undoing everything that happened up to that point. It really does feel like two films awkwardly smushed together, and it made me yearn for the World's Finest film that could have been if Zack Snyder weren't fixated on recreating the iconic fight from The Dark Knight Returns, which even there only happened because Frank Miller couldn't figure out how else to end the story.

I'll wrap this up as I'm going on at some length here. It's really quite depressing. Superman is my favourite superhero, and I wanted this movie to be good. I liked Man of Steel and I thought Watchmen was genuinely brilliant, so I was prepared to give Batman v Superman the benefit of the doubt. But sadly, cool fight scenes cannot rescue a botched screenplay that can't make up its mind which of two distinct stories it's trying to tell. Here's hoping that Wonder Woman's movie is an improvement - she's the best thing about this one, even if she's only really here to promote her solo outing. But that just sums up Batman v Superman, really: everything here only exists to set up potentially much more interesting films in the future. It's a pity we couldn't cut to the chase.

Images: Warner Bros.  

Emlyn's top 10 films of 2015

I shan't bother faffing around with the introduction, but instead get straight to the (hopefully) interesting stuff. 2015 was a very good year at the cinema, and these are my picks for the ten best films of that year. So in no particular order, here we go!

WHIPLASH

Whiplash is a film that manages to make endless, self-indulgent drum solos unbearably tense and exciting, so it definitely gets points for that. But more than that, it's a fascinating investigation of what it takes to succeed, the drive you need to have and the price you have to be willing to pay for it. It's also propelled by two of the year's best performances, and J.K. Simmons' monstrously evil, yet oddly understandable, Terence Fletcher remains one of 2015's most memorable characters.

THE FALLING

I don't know why I like this film so much. Genuinely. I have no idea what it was about, and I barely know what happened in it. But it creates an atmosphere like nothing else I've seen this year; it's not a horror film, but it's weird, haunting and unsettling in all the best ways. An under-seen gem, it's definitely one to seek out. 

CAROL

Carol is the main reason why this list is a little late. I only got around to seeing it the other day, and I had a feeling it would end up here. I'm happy to have been proved right. An understated, beautifully performed illicit romance in 1950s New York, it's safe to say that many Oscars will be coming this one's way. Cate Blanchett is one of the best actresses alive, and the final shot may be my favourite of the year.

THE MARTIAN

Ridley Scott made a good movie again! It's been a long while, but he finally returns to the genre that made his name with smashing success. The Martian is a compelling survival drama that's also one of the most unexpectedly funny films of the year, and is a shining example of how you can make a smart, scientifically accurate (mostly) film that doesn't feel the need to talk down to its audience.

CRIMSON PEAK

I'll probably catch flak for this one, but I thought Crimson Peak was a hoot. The marketing was terrible, it's not a horror movie, but if you go into it in the right mindset, it's great fun. It's an over-the-top Grand Guignol gothic melodrama, with gorgeous set design and just the right amount of self-aware silliness. It's as if the old Hammer horror team decided to make a pantomime. 

INSIDE OUT

After a raft of middling-to-good sequels like Monsters University and original films like Brave that didn't quite live up to expectations, Pixar finally returned to their usual level of quality with Inside Out. Maybe a little too clever for kids, you certainly have to admire their guts in putting a character struggling with depression in a children's movie. One of the most emotionally complex and rewarding animated films we've seen in some time. 

EX MACHINA

The best pure SF film of year, Ex Machina proves that complex, talky, thoughtful science fiction still has a place at the multiplex. Its dissection of tech-bro culture, the complicated implications of beautiful female robots, and the risks and rewards inherent in the idea of artificial intelligence add up to a film that practically demands multiple viewings. Alicia Vikander kicked off a remarkable year with a star-making turn here, and it would be great if she could join her co-stars Oscar Isaac and Domhnall Gleeson in a future Star Wars film. 

SONG OF THE SEA

Without question the most staggeringly gorgeous film released this year, Song Of The Sea confirms Cartoon Saloon as the Irish equivalent of Studio Ghibli. Weaving Celtic mythology amid a story of a young girl growing up and finding her true identity, it's really quite hard to overstate how stunning this film is to look at. It should have won the 2015 animated feature Oscar. Yes, it's better than The LEGO movie. 

THE WINNERS - MAD MAX: FURY ROAD & STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS

This one is a cheat, I freely admit, but I just can't choose between them. If forced to, I might give the edge slightly to Star Wars, largely by virtue of being a really good Star Wars movie in a world where it looked very unlikely that there would be any more good Star Wars movies. And it was wonderful - it feels like Star Wars like nothing else has for a very long time, and with a certain moment involving a blue lightsaber at the climax, it's safe to say the old magic is back. The fact that a new generation's heroes are a black man and a woman is a truly wonderful thing, as well, bringing some long-overdue diversity to the Galaxy Far, Far Away.

But where The Force Awakens was a loving, nostalgia-drenched return to a world we've loved for nearly 40 years now, Fury Road took a much different, bolder approach. Eschewing continuity and chronology altogether, George Miller's magnum opus is post-apocalyptic science fiction as epic myth, where the films and characters don't match up or make much sense when considered together, but still manage to resonate as these kinds of stories are meant to.

I'm a devoted Star Wars fan, but I had no such fondness for the Mad Max franchise. The Road Warrior is an excellent film, but I wouldn't have said I was a fan of Max. But Fury Road, with its turbo-charged, unbelievably ludicrous action sequences, surprising narrative weight and magnificent feminist hero Furiosa, is simply one of the greatest action films ever made, and will be considered a classic in the years to come.