Another Year (2012): review: 6/10

London: a suburban couple nearing retirement entertain friends and family: they are visited by a female alcoholic, brothers, their son and the son`s partner. We see their relationships change over the course of a year.

The film emphasises the importance of blood ties over friendship: this is cruelly illustrated in their unsympathetic treatment of their lonely alchoholic friend Mary when she arrives unexpectedly at their house. She is not really part of the family and her difficulties are coldly treated.

There are many unpleasant aspects to Mike Leigh`s films. One is with the female characters, who seem invariably in stereotypically female  "caring professions"". They are often frumpy, physically unattractive, given to fantasy, anxious, incapable and over-eager to please (here this is illustrated in a plot line about a used car which the unfortunate Mary buys, and which causes her a good degree of nuisance). They are ignorant and speak hideous English. This is conveyed in a mannered style of acting which seems to consist entirely of nervous tics and is grotesque to watch. In this particular film, the female caricature of Mary is contrasted with her opposite: the mother figure and a more emotionally stable black nurse who becomes pregnant.

Leigh`s treatment of vulnerable people is often mocking. There are two scenes in this film in which the characters make sexual advances: both are pitiful, and played in such a way as to invite the condescension of the viewer.

However, despite these moral shortfalls, the film conveys something about the selfish circles of family, and the rejection of outsiders when they place any sort of burden on family: it does so without too much obviousness.

Sleepwalk With Me (2012): review: 7.5/10

New York: an aspiring comedian begins to make sketches based on his indecision about marriage. he becomes increasingly successful as he works better gigs.

 Diverting piece, if occasionally amateurish piece, with something to say about humour as a function of honest confession, and something to say about the way relationships have to move forward towards marriage if they aren't to die, and something to say about building a career.

Creation (2009): review: 6.5/10

Darwin's faith, and that of his wife, become challenged by his conculsions as he works on The Origin of Species in his country home.

He is troubled by sickness and one of his children dies. He is encouraged by friends in the scientific community. His relationship with the Parish Vicar deteriorates.

The directing style is imaginative, but the films themes are probably unfilmable and it drags.

The Words (2012): review: 6/10

New York: How an ambitious writer wrote his first successful book: a fable.

The themes of this book are ambition  theft, anger,  deception, guilt and shame, and at times it conveys these well, especially in themes featuring Irons.

 However, there is something  overly polished about this film, that makes it less enjoyable and spontaneous than one might desire (in other words, there is an excellent budget film noir lurking inside this somewhere).

 Perhaps this  lack of life is partly due to the obvious New York setting, and perhaps it is also to do with the absence of real passion between the couple at the centre of the film- this largely the fault of the bland wife who reminded me of the models used in mail order catalogues to sell hosiery.

Perks of Being a WallFlower (2012): review: 3/10

A young man with literary interests starts high school where, after a humiliating start, he makes some friends and begins his first romantic relationship with a bossy girl, despite a strong attraction to a more charming female member of his set who, alas, seems more interested in men who maltreat her- much like his sister.

The film begins sympathetically enough, but rapidly turns routinous with  stock characters, such as a standard issue flamboyant homosexual and various jocks. The direction is unimaginative and the soundtrack is obvious.

It compares badly to Donnie Darko.

Damsels in Distress (2011): review: 1/10

Three women proffer advice to newcomers in an American campus, running a self-styled Suicide Prevention Centre and trying to initiate a dance craze. There is also a conflict with the campus newspaper`s editor.

With a dead performance from Greta Gerwig as central actor, and a dud script with little plot, the film presents nothing more that a hail of obscure snobberies.

Like many US films, Damsels suffers from a claustrophobic insularity: it is surely pertinent that the villain of the piece is a foreigner, specifically a French sodomite.

I think what made the other Stillman films effective was that excentric and, occasionally snobbish, characters were placed in challenging environments: either abroad as in Barcelona, or in New York. Thus, we could see  them as an outsiders, and feel a certain sympathy for  their individualism. In this film, the outsiders are now insiders: their elitism becomes considerably less likeable as a result.

Wicker Park (2004): review 2/10

Chicago: a man sees a former partner in a cafe and, intrigued, delays an important business trip to China to investigate.


The piece begins well enough, successfully creating suspense, but, gosh!, after that the plot becomes so convoluted it would be quite impossible for any sane person follow it for the rest of the film.