Eddie the Eagle

Year of Release:  2016
Director:   Dexter Fletcher
Screenplay:  Sean Macaulay
Starring:   Taron Egerton, Hugh Jackman, Iris Berben, Mark Benton, Keith Allan, Jo Hartley
Running Time:  106 minutes
Genre:  biopic, comedy, drama, sports

Those of you old enough and with long enough memories may remember the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, where Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards became the first British competitor in the ski jump event and spectacularly failed to win any medals and ended up coming in last.  However, he became something of a national treasure and something of a beloved character.

This film focuses on Eddie's dogged attempts to make the Olympics.  Deciding that there is no way to get into the Summer Games he focuses his attentions on the Winter Games and, failing to get into the British team as a skier, despite being quite good at it, turns his attentions to ski jumping.

The film takes a lot of liberties with Eddie's real life.  Hugh Jackman's gruff boozed up coach who reluctantly agrees to help Eddie, is entirely fictional.  However, this is a solid heart-warming underdog sports movie.  It's funny, slight and entertaining.  Even though you know how it all turns out, it still manages to make you root for Eddie.

The film could have been a lot crueller, making Edwards a figure of fun, particularly given his eccentric appearance and mannerisms, but to it's credit it really doesn't.  Egerton gives a good performance as Edwards, almost unrecognisable with Edwards' jutting chin, clenched teeth and peering from behind thick coke-bottle glasses.  Jackman is charismatic as the gruff alcoholic ex-ski jumper  who takes the Eagle under his wing.    

Trumbo

Year of Release:  2015
Director:  Jay Roach
Screenplay:  John McNamara, based on the book Dalton Trumbo by Bruce Cook
Starring:   Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane, Helen Mirren, Louis C.K., Elle Fanning, John Goodman, Michael Stuhlbarg,
Running Time:  124 minutes

This is a very entertaining slice of Hollywood history.  In the late 1940s and 1950s, acclaimed screenwriter Dalton Trumbo (Cranston) becomes one of the "Hollywood Ten", investigated by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, and blacklisted from the entertainment industry, forbidden to work in film in any capacity, all due to his Communist leanings.

The film is intelligent, funny and well-made. The acting is fantastic, especially from the Oscar-nominated Cranston as Trumbo, and Helen Mirren as venomous gossip columnist Hedda Hopper.  As with all based on fact films, the idea of this being entirely accurate need sot be taken with a pinch of salt, but as entertainment it definitely works.  It also works as a fascinating look at a shameful moment in Hollywood history.          

Deadpool

Year of Release:  2016
Director:  Tim Miller
Screenplay:  Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese, based on the character created by Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld
Starring:  Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, T. J. Miller, Gina Carano, Brianna Hildebrand, Stefan Kapicic
Running Time:   108 minutes

This film is based on the Marvel Comics character created by Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld, and is technically part of the X-Men franchise.  The movie tells the story of Wade Wilson (Reynolds) a wisecracking mercenary, who discovers that he has cancer.  Reluctantly he agrees to an experimental treatment which is designed to trigger mutant abilities.  The end result is that it cures his cancer and leaves him well-nigh invulnerable, but also hideously scarred and even more unbalanced than before.  Discovering the sinister purpose behind the treatment, and feeling unable to return to Vanessa (Baccarin), the woman he loves, due to his mutilated appearance, Wilson renames himself Deadpool and sets out for violent revenge.

This is a hugely entertaining film. It's fast, funny and full of violent action.  Deadpool frequently breaks the fourth wall, addressing jokes and comments directly to the audience, and being seemingly aware that he is a fictional character.  The action is stylish and violent (it is definitely one of the most violent of the Marvel Comics movies).  It's a film that is definitely made by fans for fans.  The problem that the film has is that the constant asides to the audience and overall flippant tone means that it's hard to connect to the characters.

It's funny and action packed, and comedy and action are very difficult genres to mix together successfully.  Deadpool doesn't always work, but it does more often than not.
    

Triple 9

Year of Release:  2016
Director:  John Hillcoat
Screenplay:  Matt Cook
Starring:  Casey Affleck, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Anthony Mackie, Aaron Paul, Norman Reedus, Woody Harrelson, Kate Winslet
Running Time:  115 minutes

This movie is a gritty, urban, cop thriller set in Atlanta, Georgia.  The story concerns a group of corrupt cops who are blackmailed by a powerful Russian-Israeli mob boss (Winslet)  into attempting a dangerous heist.  The gang decide that the only way to pull off the heist is to kill a fellow police officer, thereby distracting the attention of the cops ("triple 9" refers to the police code for "officer down").

The film is well performed by a very good cast, and there are some really good moments.  The opening robbery scene is fantastic, but the middle of the film sags, although it does pick up as it goes along.  The problem is that there is nothing really distinctive about it.  There is really nothing here that you haven't seen before in countless other cop thrillers.  The characterization is minimal with the result that it is very hard to care about anyone in the film, and the relentlessly moving camera just makes the action look confused.

It's the kind of movie that will probably have a long life on late night cable, and it passes the time, and it is quite entertaining, but you'll probably have seen it all before.       

Play It Again, Sam

Year of Release:  1972
Director:  Herbert Ross  
Screenplay:  Woody Allen, based on the stage play Play It Again, Sam by Woody Allen
Starring:  Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Tony Roberts
Running Time:  85 minutes

In this film written by Woody Allen, and based on his 1969 Broadway play, San Francisco film critic Allan Felix (Allen) is broken-hearted since his recent divorce.  His best friend Dick (Roberts) and Dick's wife, Linda (Keaton), try and help as best they can by setting him up on a succession of disastrous dates.  However Allan finds himself increasingly drawn to Linda, who is herself feeling neglected by her workaholic husband.  Allan's secret weapon in his quest for love, is romantic advice from none other than a ghostly Humphrey Bogart (Jerry Lacy).

Despite not having Allen in the director's chair and the move to San Francisco than Allen's more usual Manhattan locations, this definitely has the feel of early seventies Woody Allen, when he was still making more conventionally comedic films (the "early funny ones") rather than his more philosophical comedies.  This definitely isn't one of his best.  It's more amusing than actually funny, several jokes will raise a smile but not much will get a laugh.  The film frequently flits between reality and Allan's memories and fantasies.  There are times when the film's origins on the stage are quite obvious (for example Allan's conversations with the imaginary Bogart, even when out in public don't elicit any kind of reaction).

The central premise of the film is interesting, with the idea of how viewers react and connect with characters on screen, a theme that Allen would return to in The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985).  Diane Keaton gives the film it's life and lifts every scene she appears in, to the point that when she's not on screen her absence is felt.  There is also a fun running gag with the workaholic Dick constantly phoning the office to give the number of where he is and where he is going (those pre cellphone days!).

However, as so often with Woody Allen his character is more annoying than sympathetic, and it's really not that funny a film.  I would also warn that a lot of the humour is quite un-PC, and it does include a rape joke which leaves quite a sour taste.      

  

Room

Year of Release: 2015
Director:  Lenny Abrahamson
Screenplay:  Emma Donoghue, based on the novel Room by Emma Donoghue
Starring:  Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Joan Allen, Sean Bridgers, William H. Macy
Running Time:  117 minutes

Put simply, this adaptation of the best-selling novel Room by Emma Donoghue sounds really unpromising.  24 year old Joy (Larson) and her 5 year old son Jack (Tremblay) live together in a furnished, but squalid and tiny garden shed, where Joy has been held prisoner for the last seven years and where Jack has lived his entire life, without ever seeing anything of the outside world except the patch of sky that can be seen through a tiny skylight.  To Joy it's a living hell where she is subjected to daily rape by her captor "Old Nick" (Bridgers), but to Jack, who Joy shields from the reality of their situation, it is a place of wonder and magic and contains his entire world.  To say anything more would be to risk spoiling it, although to be honest, if you've seen the trailer or the poster than you'll get a pretty good idea.

This is not a horror film and it is not really a crime film (although obviously it centres on a crime).  The story is told through Jack's eyes, it opens seven years into Joy's ordeal, we never see her abduction and Old Nick's assaults are never shown.  It's a film about the bond between a mother and her child, and it is also about how people find strength even in the worst possible circumstances.  It's a harrowing, heartbreaking but ultimately redemptive film.  

The performances are fantastic with Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay both fantastic,  Larson managing to convey so much of the horror of the situation with just a look, and Tremblay giving an astonishing debut performance.  

Many people will probably be put off the film simply by the premise, and that is completely understandable, it is definitely not for everyone.  However it is worth giving it a chance because it is really stunning.