Crimson Peak (2015) Review

Time: 119 Minutes
Age Rating: Graphic violence, horror, sex scenes and offensive language
Cast:
Mia Wasikowska as Edith Cushing
Jessica Chastain as Lucille Sharpe
Tom Hiddleston as Thomas Sharpe
Charlie Hunnam as Dr. Alan McMichael
Jim Beaver as Carter Cushing
Director: Guillermo del Toro

Edith (Mia Wasikowska) ignores her father’s warning and marries Sir Thomas Sharpe (Tom Hiddleston). When she arrives at the Sharpe mansion, she learns about her husband’s secrets and realises that the place is teeming with ghosts.

Guillermo del Toro’s Crimson Peak got quite a mixed reception upon its release, mostly because of expectations. I was one of group of people who really liked it, and I liked it even more when I watched it again. On a writing, acting and especially directing level, I thought it was great and I was invested throughout.

First of all, Crimson Peak is not really a horror movie, horror is really the secondary genre for this movie. Don’t look at the trailers because they are misleading, and don’t really accurately represent the movie. It’s also not a straight up ghost story, there are plenty of grotesque ghosts but they serve more as a backdrop to the real plot, in a similar way as another ghost story from Guillermo del Toro named The Devil’s Backbone. Whereas that movie was a drama mystery containing horror elements, Crimson Peak is a gothic and period piece romance film that has horror elements. The story is a gothic fairy tale, and a masterfully crafted Victorian era murder story. The atmosphere is great, and there are some well placed twists. The movie is somewhat over the top and cheesy at times, but it’s intended to be that way. It is unapologetically soap opera and embraces that at points. At the same time, it is very dark and haunting, with a good amount of tension and suspense throughout. It’s not for everyone, you get the feeling that it was really made for a niche audience. I’d say that within the first 30 minutes, you’ll be able to figure out if this movie is your thing or not.

The acting is all great, but there are mainly 3 performances who stand out the most. Mia Wasikowska plays her lead character with such humanity. Tom Hiddleston is effectively charming yet conflicted, and fits his role well. However, Jessica Chastain was the actor that stood out the most for me in the cast. As her character she’s unnerving, campy, evil and unhinged, and she played her role fantastically. Other actors in the supporting cast including Charlie Hunnam also play their parts well in their screentime.

Guillermo del Toro’s direction is great as to be expected, especially on a visual level. The cinematography adds another layer to the whole picture, with its well staged shots and gorgeous aesthetics (especially the use of red). The lighting is perfect while the use of colours is fabulous, while the camera movements, angles and transitions are smoothly carried out. It really makes you feel like you’re in a different world. The set and costume designs are also incredibly detailed, the main haunted house is particularly fantastic. There’s also some creepy imagery that’s quite memorable when its present. The ghosts provide the most scares, particularly wit the jump scares. While people don’t really like jump scares, it did add some horror atmosphere and does spice up things for the audience from the slow and deliberate story. The moments of violence also stand out and punctuates the otherwise gothic fantasy feeling of the movie. The poetic score from Fernando Velazquez also fits the movie perfectly.

Crimson Peak is great, it’s dark, visually gorgeous, and well put together and acted. Again, it’s not for everyone. But if you are interested in watching it, go in expecting a gothic romance with horror elements, not a full on horror movie. I might be in the minority of this, but I think it’s in the stronger half of Guillermo del Toro’s filmography, and by far his most underrated film.

Advertisement

Pacific Rim (2013) Review

Time: 132 Minutes
Age Rating: Violence
Cast:
Charlie Hunnam as Raleigh Becket
Idris Elba as Marshal Stacker Pentecost
Rinko Kikuchi as Mako Mori
Charlie Day as Dr. Newton ‘Newt’ Geiszler
Ron Perlman as Hannibal Chau
Robert Kazinsky as Chuck Hansen
Max Martini as Hercules “Herc” Hansen
Clifton Collins Jr. as Tendo Choi
Burn Gorman as Dr. Hermann Gottlieb
Director: Guillermo del Toro

The government assumes the Jaegers, robotic war machines battling the Kaijus, to be ineffective. However, Stacker Pentecost’s (Idris Elba) team believes that only the Jaegers can save the world from destruction.

It had been a while since I watched Pacific Rim, I remembered liking it when I watched it previously. Having re-watched many of del Toro’s movies more recently however, I decided to revisit it. It is quite a different movie from Del Toro, a large scale blockbuster, even larger than the Hellboy movies. Pacific Rim isn’t great, but it is far better than it had any right to be, with it being quite entertaining and well made generally.

The story itself is pretty predictable and by the numbers for this genre, and a lot of the characters are typical and I wasn’t really invested with them. I will say that to the movie’s credit, there was character development and depth and at least they made an effort with them (although not enough to make the characters great). Also while the story isn’t anything special, the story is not overly complicated and is straight forward enough, while also having subplots which fit into the rest of the story quite well. When watching Pacific Rim, live-action anime was what really came to mind, and from what I can tell they really pulled it off. It really is a solid harmony between sci-fi and monster movies. The movie is undoubtedly silly, but it fully embraces its silliness. The movie is self aware, and some of the dialogue is cheesy yet awesome at times (Idris Elba’s “We are cancelling the apocalypse” comes to mind). Del Toro knew exactly what movie he was making and that really works to its benefit. At the same time, it doesn’t feel like a cash-grab or lazy blockbuster, it’s clear that a lot of love and effort was put into making this movie.

The cast I’d say are probably decent at best but most of the problems goes to the characters, for the most part there isn’t quite enough material for the actors to be great. Charles Hunnam is a decent actor and he’s okay in the leading role here, albeit quite bland. However his character doesn’t have much to him, the only thing I remembered about him is that he was played by Charlie Hunnam and his brother dies early in the movie. The two performances that stood out the most in the movie for me were Rinko Kikuchi and Idris Elba. Charlie Day and Burn Gorman play over the top eccentric scientists, and Ron Perlman is also entertaining in his few scenes. The rest of the cast I don’t really remember, they don’t really leave much of an impression.

Guillermo del Toro is the reason why Pacific Rim was as good as it was, it would’ve been a lot weaker without his direction. It is visually stunning, with some beautiful cinematography, great use of colour, as well as detailed production design. The spectacular visual effects have held up quite well even over 7 years later, with the CGI being near perfect. The action sequences are among the parts that stand out the most, and those scenes are really great. The action is very large and does well at showing off the scale and designs of the two opposing forces. It would’ve been so easy for these moments to look like a mess, but with Pacific Rim, you can really get a good look at everything that’s happening on screen. The battles during the night-time are particularly look great. There’s a battle that takes place at night time around halfway through and that’s where it really where the movie took a step up for me. The monsters were greatly designed and detailed (as you can expect from del Toro).

Pacific Rim is definitely a silly action movie, however it is nonetheless an entertaining blockbuster that knows what it is. Even with the dumb moments and less than stellar characters, it’s directed quite well and generally keeps you watching for the visuals alone. It’s definitely in the lower section of Guillermo del Toro’s filmography but his work here is still impressive. I think it’s worth a watch at the very least, if you haven’t seen it already.

Children of Men (2006) Review

Time: 109 Minutes
Age Rating: Contains violence, offensive language and drug use
Cast:
Clive Owen as Theo Faron
Julianne Moore as Julian Taylor
Clare-Hope Ashitey as Kee
Michael Caine as Jasper Palmer
Chiwetel Ejiofor as Luke
Charlie Hunnam as Patric
Pam Ferris as Miriam
Director: Alfonso Cuarón

When infertility threatens mankind with extinction and the last child born has perished, a disillusioned bureaucrat (Clive Owen) becomes the unlikely champion in the fight for the survival of Earth’s population; He must face down his own demons and protect the planet’s last remaining hope from danger.

I’ve been meaning to rewatch Children of Men for a while. I watched it years ago and I remember myself finding it to be good. As I was watching Alfonso Cuarón’s films recently however (Roma and Y Tu Mama Tambien), I had an urge to see this movie again, just to refresh it in my mind. I’m not quite sure why I wasn’t in love with this movie when I first saw it, but Children of Men is truly spectacular. As acclaimed as the movie is, I still feel like it isn’t as appreciated as much as it should be, it needs to be talked about a lot more.

I actually didn’t know of this until recently but Children of Men is based on a book of the same name. The writing here is excellent. They really created a unique dystopian concept and made it feel and seem so real. Unlike some other sci-fi movies, much of what happens here feels very plausible, making it a very timeless and relevant film today over a decade later. At the same time, they also deliver on creating a deep and emotional story, with very real, greatly written and fully realised characters. It takes less than 10 minutes to already invest you in this world. You feel a sense of dread throughout and the stakes are high, however it’s in a way that feels genuine and human. This film is under 2 hours long and from start to finish (at least on my rewatch) I was hanging onto every single moment. I’ll even admit that the last 20 minutes of the movie had me quite emotional, Children of Men is very powerful throughout but it is particularly in this portion.

As previously mentioned, all of the characters are very well written and memorable, and the cast are all great playing their respective roles. Clive Owen gives one of his all time best performances here, if not his best. Here he’s playing a reluctant hero character of sorts, forced into getting involved with a cause bigger than himself. We’ve seen this with lead characters many times before but with the writing and Owen’s fantastic performance, it just feels so real here. Julianne Moore is really good in the screentime that she gets. Clare-Hope Ashitey is also really great as the only woman in the world who isn’t infertile and is currently pregnant, holding possibly humanity’s last remaining hope for survival. It’s also fun watching Michael Caine as a hippie character of sorts, and he too does add to the movie quite a bit. The rest of the supporting cast including Chiwetel Ejiofor and Charlie Hunnam also are great in their roles.

Alfonso Cuarón as usual directs incredibly well, and this is probably his best film to date. The story and setting already feels very plausible but add upon the fantastic production design and it really feels timeless. His work with cinematographer Emmanuelle Lubezki was spectacular, there are so many phenomenal cinematic moments, most of them featuring long tracking shots, that you just wonder how exactly they managed to shoot it. A famous example being in the first quarter of the film, featuring a very long tracking shot that takes place in a car. Another example is a very long shot following Clive Owen for a very long time towards the end of the movie, really all of it is amazing filmmaking, it’s overwhelming at times.

Children of Men isn’t just one of the best science fiction films released, it’s one of the greatest films of the 21st Century. I’m not sure why it didn’t receive more awards attention, because it really deserves it. Everything here is perfect, the characters and cast, the fully realised story and world, and the fantastic direction by Alfonso Cuarón. If you haven’t seen it yet, make sure that you see it as soon as possible, it’s a masterpiece.

The Gentlemen (2019) Review

Time: 113 minutes
Age Rating: Violence, offensive language, drug use & sexual material
Cast:
Matthew McConaughey as Mickey Pearson
Charlie Hunnam as Raymond
Henry Golding as Dry Eye
Michelle Dockery as Rosalind Pearson
Jeremy Strong as Matthew Berger
Eddie Marsan as Mike
Colin Farrell as Coach
Hugh Grant as Fletcher
Director: Guy Ritchie

Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey) is an American expatriate who became rich by building a marijuana empire in London. When word gets out that he’s looking to cash out of the business, it soon triggers an array of plots and schemes from those who want his fortune.

The Gentlemen was one of my most anticipated movies of 2020. Director Guy Ritchie hasn’t been doing so well with his recent movies. People have wanted him to return to the crime genre that made Ritchie known, with the likes of Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch and RocknRolla, and with The Gentlemen we finally have that. Add on top of that a great cast, and there was a lot there I was looking forward to. I found myself to be really entertained by The Gentlemen, and it was a nice way of starting off the new decade for movies.

The Gentlemen feels like a movie that Guy Ritchie could’ve made back in the 2000s, for better and for worse. The characters and story aren’t necessarily interesting, but they’re nonetheless very well written and entertaining, in the same way that Snatch was really entertaining. There isn’t much action in the movie, in fact the dialogue really is the action. It’s sharp, memorable, and really funny, and I’m a fan of well done dark humour, so this really worked for me. This movie is very much not politically correct to say the least, and I know that a lot of people won’t like some of the jokes (and it’s understandable). I mostly liked it, and it doesn’t feel like it’s necessarily trying to be too edgy for the most part. With that said, there were a couple moments that probably should’ve been left out, one in particular was really unneeded and shouldn’t have been included in the first place. Most of the movie for what it is though was really good.

A large part of why this movie works so well is the fantastic cast, with Matthew McConaughey, Charlie Hunnam, Henry Golding, Michelle Dockery, Jeremy Strong, Eddie Marsan, Colin Farrell and Hugh Grant. McConaughey is in the lead role, and although he seems a little out of place with him being really the only American in the main cast, he fits into the movie rather well. Hunnam actually surprised me quite a lot, he really does some good work here. The two standouts to me personally were Colin Farrell and Hugh Grant. Farrell is in a minor role but gets so many moments to shine. However, this may just be Grant’s movie, he’s in a completely different role that you’re used to seeing him in. He steals the show every time he’s on screen, he’s the one actually telling much of the story, and he’s constantly entertaining.

Guy Ritchie is definitely at home directing in this genre. While his style like much of the story and the like are similar to his other crime movies, it’s polished up rather nicely here. All of his style works, especially when it comes to Grant’s character telling the story. A lot of people could say that this movie is style over substance, but with Ritchie, his style is his substance, and it works pretty well for the film.

The Gentlemen is a return to form for Guy Ritchie. It’s darkly hilarious, constantly entertaining, effectively written and directed, and the cast do well. It’s not quite on the level on some of his other movies, but it’s still by far his best movie in many years. If you liked Ritchie’s past crime movies, this might just be what you’re looking for, if you’re not then don’t bother with this one. I hope he continues to make more of these types of movies instead of his recent blockbusters, because he’s really great at the former.

Triple Frontier (2019) Review

Time: 125 Minutes
Cast:
Ben Affleck as Tom “Redfly” Davis
Oscar Isaac as Santiago “Pope” Garcia
Charlie Hunnam as William “Ironhead” Miller
Garrett Hedlund as Ben Miller
Pedro Pascal as Francisco “Catfish” Morales
Adria Arjona as Yovanna
Director: J. C. Chandor

Former Special Forces operatives reunite to plan a heist in a sparsely populated multi-border zone of South America. For the first time in their prestigious careers, these unsung heroes undertake this dangerous mission for themselves instead of the country. But when events take an unexpected turn and threaten to spiral out of control, their skills, their loyalties, and their morals are pushed to a breaking point in an epic battle for survival.

Triple Frontier was one of my anticipated movies of 2019. While there are plenty of heist movies, what made it stand apart from the others was a very talented main cast, with the likes of Oscar Isaac and Ben Affleck among them. I honestly didn’t know what to expect from it outside of that, but I was more than satisfied and entertained with the end result.

Triple Frontier is a straightforward heist movie, and at around 2 hours it had me interested for the entire runtime. The whole movie isn’t just about the heist, it’s the heist and then everything following the heist. As that, I was engaged in the plot and characters, especially as they kept being thrown into dire situations. Some people said that the movie kind of dropped off towards the second half, especially in terms of pacing. I didn’t feel that personally, I was pretty riveted throughout the entirety of the movie. Honestly my issue with the pacing was in the early parts of the movie, as it felt a little rushed as it was trying to establish all the characters. I guess the last action sections of the movie felt a tad underwhelming in comparison to those before it but that’s it, I was also fine with the direction the story was going in. The movie at the end leaves room open for a sequel, even though I wouldn’t mind seeing a follow up to Triple Frontier, I’m pretty sure we don’t really need one.

The cast was one of the biggest selling points, with the 5 leads Oscar Isaac, Ben Affleck, Charlie Hunnam, Garrett Hedlund and Pedro Pascal, and they certainly delivered. You can tell throughout that this film is heavily relying on the characters and their actors to elevate the movie above just being another heist movie, thankfully they did. Their chemistry together is really believable, the film doesn’t even have to delve into too much detail about their backstories together because they just work so well off each other. Oscar Isaac (who is pretty much the main lead of the movie) leads the other characters very well, Ben Affleck surprises quite a bit with his performance here, and the rest of the cast as usual play their parts greatly.

J.C. Chandor has done some good work with his direction with All Is Lost and A Most Violent Year. His work on Triple Frontier was good as well, with it being a really great looking movie, it’s really shot well by Roman Vasyanov. It really places you with these characters and the places they go. The action scenes are also solid, they aren’t particularly stand out and aren’t anything that we haven’t seen before, but nonetheless were good enough for what they needed to be. The score by Disasterpiece is also very effective.

Triple Frontier is entertaining, thrilling and well directed, with the great work from the talented main cast being the highlight. While it has some issues, Triple Frontier is one of the better movies that Netflix has put out and is one of the more stand out heist movies in recent years, definitely worth a watch when you get a chance.

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017) Review

Time: 126 Minutes
Age Rating:
Contains violence and offensive language
Cast:
Charlie Hunnam as King Arthur
Àstrid Bergès-Frisbey as The Mage
Djimon Hounsou as Sir Bedivere
Aidan Gillen as Sir William “Goosefat Bill”
Jude Law as Vortigern
Eric Bana as Uther Pendragon
Director: Guy Ritchie

After the murder of his father, young Arthur’s power-hungry uncle Vortigern (Jude Law) seizes control of the crown. Robbed of his birthright, he grows up the hard way in the back alleys of the city, not knowing who he truly is. When fate leads him to pull the Excalibur sword from stone, Arthur (Charlie Hunnam) embraces his true destiny to become a legendary fighter and leader.

I wasn’t sure if I was looking forward to King Arthur. It has a great cast, and most importantly is directed by Guy Ritchie, a filmmaker I like quite a bit due to his unique and fast paced style. But nothing much about the movie really interested me from the trailers, it looked like an okay-ish fantasy movie. I know that a lot of people really didn’t like King Arthur (it’s the first box office bomb of 2017) but I was glad I decided to see it. The acting was good, the way the story was told was effective but Ritchie’s great direction really was the standout. It won’t be known as one of the all time greatest fantasy movies but it is still a good one.

Now this story is very familiar and very much like a typical fantasy story (minus the direction and interpretation by Ritchie), but it’s not the same King Arthur story that you’re used to seeing. Don’t go into it expecting the usual representations of King Arthur. I was just going in expecting a fantasy movie by Guy Ritchie with the main character titled Arthur and I was very entertained and invested throughout. This story is full on magic and fantasy, and it was entertaining to see how this movie approached it. This film does overall move at a pretty fast pace and it didn’t ever bore me. As Guy Ritchie wrote this movie, he does have a particular style and I really liked it. The dialogue was entertained and the humour was well implemented in the movie.

Charlie Hunnam is great here as Arthur, very likable, entertaining and believable. I haven’t seen him in much (just Pacific Rim and Crimson Peak) but this is his most entertaining performance yet. Definitely the strongest character in the whole movie. Jude Law plays and a very hateable villain and did a very good job at it, fully embracing his role. This movie has a wide range of talented actors with Djimon Hounsou, Astrid Berges-Frisbey, Eric Bana, Aidan Gillen and many others. All of them are used pretty effectively and share great chemistry with each other, their characters weren’t quite as 3 dimensional as they could’ve been but they were still very enjoyable to watch. The only actors who were a little out of place were Katie McGrath (as she’s on screen for a total of only 1 minute) and a random cameo of David Beckham (I have no idea why he was here), especially as he appears in such a pivotal scene for Arthur.

As great the acting and story is, the stand out part of this movie is of course Guy Ritchie’s direction. This is the most Guy Ritchie that a Guy Ritchie film has been since Snatch. I was worried about how his style would be used here but I found it did work, its so unlike a King Arthur movie to have and Ritchie fully embraced that style and so I enjoyed it a lot. The fast paced editing is used really well. At times it does move a little too fast so it is easy to miss some of the details but that goes for most Guy Ritchie movies. If you don’t like his style, you probably won’t like King Arthur. I know some people really didn’t like that his style was used in a King Arthur movie, but I liked that, not just because I like the style, but it gave something new to a King Arthur story, it’s not just a typical fantasy story that we’ve seen so many times. At times it does sort of tonally feel inconsistent, one moment might be very comedic and have one of the Guy Ritchie montages, and in the next moment might be a fantasy action sequence or a very serious dramatic scene. Most of the CGI is used really effectively and made for some really entertaining action sequences. A standout is the soundtrack by Daniel Pemberton, it could be grand and epic but it could also fit perfectly with Ritchie’s wacky style and montages.

King Arthur is not a perfect movie but I do think that it’s worth a watch, nowhere near deserves the hate its getting or being a box office bomb. With the actors, the entertaining story but most of all, Guy Ritchie’s direction, I was consistently entertained by this movie. I honestly recommend going out and seeing King Arthur, give it a chance (as long as you know what you’re going in for). If you aren’t a big fan of Guy Ritchie’s style however, you probably won’t be a fan.