Archive
LE VOL DES CIGOGNES/FLIGHT OF THE STORKS – Éric Neveux
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Flight of the Storks (Le Vol des Cigognes) is a French TV mini series starring Harry Treadaway as Jonathan, a young English academic ornithologist who teams up with a colleague to follow storks on their migration from Switzerland to Africa. However, when his colleague is found dead in mysterious circumstances, Jonathan finds himself caught up in an international web of intrigue, travelling through Bulgaria, Turkey, the Middle East, and the Congo along the pathway of the migrating storks, with a dogged Swiss detective hot on his heels. This mini-series was directed by Jan Kounen adapted from the novel by Jean-Christophe Grangé, co-starred Rutger Hauer and Perdita Weeks, and was scored by French composer Éric Neveux. Read more…
NIEDŹWIEDŹ: WŁADCA GÓR/LORD OF THE CARPATHIANS – Bartlomiej Gliniak
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Lord of the Carpathians – Niedźwiedź: Władca Gór in its original Polish – is a feature documentary directed by Krystian Matysek about brown bears living in the Carpathian Mountains of eastern Europe. A well-regarded and well-made film, it won awards at the International Festival of Films on the Environment in Banska Bystrica, and at the International Festival of Nature Films in Lodz in 2012, before recieving a short theatrical release at the beginning of 2013. Read more…
JACK REACHER – Joe Kraemer
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Jack Reacher is a new action-thriller film directed by Christopher McQuarrie, based on the popular character created by author Lee Child. This film is based on the plot of the novel “One Shot”, and stars Tom Cruise in the title role as an ex-military investigator called in to help ambitious defense attorney Helen Rodin (Rosamund Pike), who sees something wrong with the apparently open-and-shut case of a former military sniper accused of killing five innocent civilians along Pittsburgh’s Allegheny River waterfront. Helped and hindered by dogged police detective Emerson (David Oyelowo) and district attorney Alex Rodin (Richard Jenkins) – Helen’s father and legal opponent – Reacher discovers that there is much more to the story than meets the eye, and that a shadowy figure known only as The Zec (Werner Herzog) may be behind it all. Director McQuarrie, still best known for winning an Oscar for writing The Usual Suspects in 1996, has crafted a tight, enjoyable, engrossing little thriller with several superb set-pieces and a labyrinthine plot that is both believable and unpredictable, while Cruise’s lead performance is a good one, full of charisma and cockiness, despite him being the physical opposite of the character in the novels. Read more…
QUO VADIS – Miklós Rózsa
GREATEST SCORES OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
Original Review by Craig Lysy
Producer Sam Zimbalist and director Mervyn LeRoy saw an opportunity to create a grand epic by adapting Henryk Sienkiewicz’s 1896 novel Quo Vadis. They hired a fine cast, which included Robert Taylor (Marcus Vinicius), Deborah Kerr (Lygia), Peter Ustinov (Nero) and Leo Glenn (Petronius). Set in imperial Rome during the reign of the maniacal emperor Nero (54 – 68 C.E.) we see a love story unfold between the pagan Marcus and the Christian Lygia. Our lovers are caught in the tide of history as an increasingly mad Nero terrorizes his court and ultimately sets Rome aflame in a stunning horrific conflagration. To cover his guilt Nero falsely blames the Christians and unleashes a reign of terror with gruesome executions in the Coliseum. Through their ensuing travails, Marcus converts and our lovers manage an escape to Sicily as an avenging mob, now aware that Nero burned Rome, storms the palace and brings Nero to a well-deserved end. The film was both a commercial and critical success, earning eight Academy Award nominations. Read more…
THE HOBBIT: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY – Howard Shore
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
They say you can never go home again, but that’s not true for Howard Shore, the multi-award winning Canadian composer of the music for The Lord of the Rings. Prior to the release of the first LOTR film, The Fellowship of the Ring, in 2001, Shore was a respected but generally little-known composer, best known for writing a series of dark, brooding scores for director David Cronenberg, and thrillers like Seven and The Silence of the Lambs. Even when he was first announced as the composer for Fellowship, many commentators questioned whether Shore had the thematic strength to write the broad and expansive music the films required. Fast forward a decade, and Shore is a three-time Oscar winner and international film music superstar, with impressive album sales, sold-out concerts, and massive critical acclaim. When director Peter Jackson announced that he was making a new Middle Earth trilogy based on JRR Tolkien’s book The Hobbit, it was never a question of whether Howard Shore would return to score the films, but whether the music would stand up to the massive hype and sense of expectation that inevitably came with it’s release. For better or worse, the Lord of the Rings scores have become some of the best-loved of the new millennium, and for many fans whose first experience of film music came through those films and Shore’s now-iconic themes, there was bound to be an unimaginable sense of anticipation. So does The Hobbit continue the trend of excellent music in Middle Earth? The answer is yes and no, but not for reasons you might think. Read more…
LIFE OF PI – Mychael Danna
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Once in a while a film comes along which seems predestined to be scored by a certain composer; in 2012, that film is Life of Pi and that composer is Mychael Danna. Based on the successful novel by Yann Martel, and directed by Ang Lee, Life of Pi is a film which asks all the big questions – about life, death, religion, fate, identity, reality – and answers them through an incredible story told by Piscine Molitor Patel (Irfan Khan), commonly known as Pi, an Indian immigrant to Canada, who relates his life story to an enraptured journalist (Rafe Spall), who is researching a book. Born into a relatively wealthy family in Pondicherry, India, where his father owned a zoo, Pi’s life is thrown into chaos after the family decides to emigrate to Canada; the boat they are traveling on capsizes in a storm, leaving 16-year old Pi (Suraj Sharma) the only survivor – except for a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan, and an ill-tempered Bengal tiger named Richard Parker, who all are forced to share the same tiny lifeboat. What follows is an extraordinary story of friendship, trust, survival, faith and belief, as Pi must overcome his greatest fears and the overpowering forces of nature to reach safety. Read more…
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK – Danny Elfman
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Films about mental illness aren’t usually side-splitting laugh-riots, but David O. Russell’s film Silver Linings Playbook, based on the novel by Matthew Quick, manages to stuff plenty of humorous moments into an otherwise quite serious film about an unlikely couple who bond over their respective psychoses. Bradley Cooper plays Pat, a former teacher who had a complete mental breakdown after his wife had an affair with a colleague; returning home from the hospital to live with his Philadelphia Eagles-obsessed parents (Robert De Niro and Jackie Weaver), and fully intending to try to reconcile with his wife, Pat unexpectedly meets and bonds with Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence), the sister of his best friend’s wife, an equally-damaged young woman whose own problems stem from the recent death of her police office husband. The film features career-best performances from Cooper and Lawrence, whose flawed and off-kilter relationship is a satirical reflection of contemporary life – the pair’s first meeting results in them happily regaling each other with tales of prescription psychoactive drug experiences, and develops from there – and I fully expect the top-billed cast and crew to receive Oscar nominations for their work in the New Year. Read more…
BREAKING DAWN, PART II – Carter Burwell
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
The massively successful Twilight franchise reaches its conclusion with the the release of Breaking Dawn Part II, the fifth and final film based on Stephanie Meyer’s incomprehensively successful vampire romance novels that follows the relationship of Bella Swan and her undead paramour, Edward Cullen. Bill Condon returns to the director’s chair, picking up where the last film left off: following the birth of their hybrid child Renesmee, Bella begins her new life as a member of the Cullen vampire clan, and for a while life seems perfect for the newlyweds. However, before long, the Volturi – an ancient order of vampires who essentially set the laws of the vampire world – find out about Renesmee, and mistakenly believe that Edward and Bella have “turned” a human child, a terrible crime which carries the penalty of death for all involved. Fearing for their lives, the Cullens begin to traverse the globe, seeking out vampire allies, in the hope of convincing the Volturi that they have nothing to fear from Renesmee, thereby avoiding the unavoidable confrontation that could mean the end of Cullen family forever. Kristin Stewart and Robert Pattinson return to their most famous roles for the final time, and are supported by familiar faces Taylor Lautner, Michael Sheen, Nikki Reed, Peter Facinelli, Elizabeth Reaser, Kellen Lutz, Ashley Greene, Jackson Rathbone, Billy Burke, Maggie Grace and Dakota Fanning. Read more…
ANNA KARENINA – Dario Marianelli
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Anna Karenina is a classic of Russian literature, written by the celebrated author Leo Tolstoy in 1873. It tells the story of the titular character, Anna, a Moscow socialite married to the taciturn Alexei Karenin, a stoic Government official 20 years her senior. Anna’s life is thrown into turmoil when she meets and falls for the dashing Count Vronsky, a handsome and wealthy cavalry officer who sweeps Anna off her feet, and shows her the true meaning of love. However, repressive societal norms, pressure from friends and family, and Anna’s own insecurities about what she wants from life means that her difficult choice between a safe, but dull life with Karenin and a wild, but potentially ostracizing life with Vronsky becomes agonizing. The story has been told on film many times over the years; this lavish new version is directed by Joe Wright from a screenplay by Tom Stoppard, stars Keira Knightley as Anna, Jude Law as Alexei, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Vronsky, and has a stellar supporting cast that includes Kelly Macdonald, Olivia Williams, Emily Watson and Matthew Macfadyen. Read more…
SKYFALL – Thomas Newman
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Coming in to write the music for your first James Bond movie must be a massively daunting task. In composing the score for Skyfall, Thomas Newman – the multi-Oscar nominated composer of such seminal scores as American Beauty and The Shawshank Redemption – not only had to cope with 50 years of cinematic history after Ursula Andress first slinked out of the Caribbean sea in Dr. No in 1962, but legions of fans who treat the movie franchise as sacred property, and the legacy of the legendary music of John Barry and his heir-apparent, David Arnold. The ‘James Bond sound’ is so iconic and so well-established that it presents a composer as unique as Newman with a dilemma: does he abandon his own sound in an attempt to fit in with the overall sound of the series, risking giving up the very thing that makes him him, or does he compose music in his own inimitable way, establishment be damned, risking the wrath of those who would then surely accuse him of not being ‘Bond’ enough? It’s a challenging tightrope, and one which Newman had to skillfully navigate. Read more…
CLOUD ATLAS – Tom Tykwer, Reinhold Heil, Johnny Klimek
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Trying to write a brief synopsis of Cloud Atlas is an exercise in futility, given that it is one of the most dense, multi-layered, and complicated – but brilliant – films in several years, but I’ll give it a go. It’s based on David Mitchell’s sprawling 2004 novel, and at it’s core is a story about humanity’s continual yearning for freedom in all its forms, the way in which the threads of life are interlinked across time and space, and how the smallest gestures in one lifetime can have enormous and profound effects on generations to come. The film spans six separate time periods across multiple geographical locations, and even different genres. Contrary to appearances, these disparate elements all do connect with each other, having been expertly woven together by directors Andy and Lana Wachowski and Tom Tykwer, who worked separately on three segments each, which were then edited together to form the final cut of the film. It stars an ensemble cast including Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Jim Sturgess, Hugo Weaving, Ben Whishaw, Susan Sarandon and Hugh Grant, all of whom play multiple roles across the different stories, under varying applications of hair, false noses and prosthetic teeth. Read more…
A WALK IN THE CLOUDS – Maurice Jarre
MOVIE MUSIC UK CLASSICS
Original Review by Craig Lysy
The screenplay for A Walk in the Clouds was adapted and updated from the original 1942 Italian film Quattro Passi Fra Le Nuvole. In this incarnation the setting is California following the end of WWII. Paul Sutton (Keanu Reeves), a veteran adapting to civilian life, boards a bus and by chance meets Victoria Aragon (Aitana Sanchez-Gijon). She is headed home from college to help her family with the autumnal grape harvest of their estate called Las Nubes, or “the clouds.” Victoria is unmarried and with child and fears for her fate when she breaks the news to her traditionalist and old world Mexican father Alberto (Giancario Giannini). A sympathetic Paul proposes to masquerade as her husband in order to assist her in her time of need. As fate would have it, Paul and Victoria fall in love, weathering countless obstacles, including Alberto’s fierce opposition in the process. A crisis that threatens Las Nubes overcomes all opposition and serves to bring the lovers and family together for the quintessential happy ending. While not a critical success, the movie resonated with the public and also earned Maurice Jarre a Golden Globe win for best Film Score. Read more…
LINCOLN – John Williams
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
In the annals of American political history, virtually no-one is as universally admired, revered and respected as Abraham Lincoln. Born into relative poverty in Kentucky in 1809, Lincoln rose from being a simple country lawyer to being elected the 16th President of the United States in 1860. During the course of his presidency Lincoln essentially re-defined the United States as we know it today, successfully defeating the Confederacy in the four-year Civil War, issuing the Emancipation Proclamation that essentially ended slavery in the country, and delivering the Gettysburg Address, one of the most famous political speeches of all time. He was re-elected in 1864 but, as we all know, was assassinated by actor John Wilkes Booth while watching a play in a Washington DC theatre in April 1865, before he could fully establish his second term. There have been many films over the years featuring Lincoln as a central figure, but director Steven Spielberg’s film – simply titled “Lincoln” – is a straightforward biopic of the man’s life and achievements. The film stars Daniel Day Lewis in the eponymous role, and features a stellar supporting cast including Sally Field as Lincoln’s wife Mary Todd, Tommy Lee Jones as republican leader Thaddeus Stevens, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Lincoln’s son Robert, David Strathairn as secretary of state William Seward, and Jackie Earle Haley, James Spader, John Hawkes, Jared Harris and Hal Holbrook in smaller roles. Read more…
WIR WOLLTEN AUFS MEER/SHORES OF HOPE – Nic Raine
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Wir Wollten Aufs Meer (Shores of Hope) is a German-language drama/thriller directed by Toke Constantin Hebbeln and starring Alexander Fehling, August Diehl and Sylvester Groth, all of whom featured in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds. Set in East Germany before the wall came down, the film follows the lives of two friends, Cornelis and Andreas, who work as longshoremen on the docks at the port of Rostock, but dream of going to sea, and escaping their country’s crushing communist regime. However, their friendship is put to the test when the Stasi, the East German secret police, approach the pair, asking them to spy on their foreman, Matze, who is suspected to be planning a daring bolt for freedom. Faced with mounting pressure from the government, Cornelis and Andreas must make a terrible decision: can they betray their principles and their consciences and report Matze’s activities to the authorities, knowing full well that he will likely be sent to prison for life, if doing so increases their own chances of a better life? Read more…
ARGO – Alexandre Desplat
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
The Iran Hostage Crisis of 1979 saw 52 American diplomats being held for over a year by Iranian authorities after the American embassy in Tehran was stormed by students and military officials, in the wider context of the Iranian Revolution that ousted the pro-western Shah of Iran, and brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power. Most people know that the public crisis was eventually ended diplomatically by the outgoing President Jimmy Carter, but what people didn’t know – at least, until documents were declassified in the 1990s – is that six embassy staffers escaped from the building before it was taken by the revolutionaries, and spent months hiding at the Canadian Ambassador’s house until they were dramatically rescued by a CIA operative working with a Hollywood makeup artist. This hitherto-unknown story is the basis of Argo, the latest film from actor-director Ben Affleck. Read more…
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