Review: Borg vs McEnroe

Tennis has not had a deep history within the film industry. To be honest, there is barely a handful or famous ones, let alone genuinely great Tennis films.
Probably the most successful one of the lot, is Alfred Hitchcock's 'Strangers On A Train'. While some may think this is more of a thriller than Tennis related, the sport plays a role in the film especially in a super tense scene at the US Open.
Other mild successes include the surprisingly good Match Point, the fascinating 2013 film documentary 'The Battle Of The Sexes', and a big guilty pleasure of mine, 'Wimbledon'.
Now in 2017, we have two big releases of Tennis films. That includes a film adaptation of the events of Battle Of The Sexes, which could be a possible Oscar contender.

The other, is new release 'Borg vs McEnroe' which portrays what people consider to be the greatest final in all of Tennis. As a passionate Tennis myself, I was excited to see how this would play out.
This particular match was most certainly a pivotal one for the future of the sport.

When the opening credits were being played, I had no idea that it was a Scandinavian production. What I liked about their production, was that everyone actually spoke their language. There was a lot of Swedish being said, as well as a lot of English.
As for the rest of the film, I think they did as good of a job as they could have done for a literal adaptation.

The performances were pretty solid on the whole. Sverrir Gudnason as Bjorn Borg was quite extraordinary. He looks completely identical as the great man himself. It reminded of when Ben Kingsley was cast as Ghandi, or Zachary Quinto as Spock. That role was definitely made for him.
The choice of casting Shia Labeouf was quite a bold move to play John McEnroe, and it worked rather well. While he might not look like McEnroe, his mannerisms were on point. Stellen Skarsgard as Borg's coach executed his role in this story really well. Playing Borg's girlfriend I first thought was Noomi Rapace. It was actually Tuva Novotny. Her hair style in the film certainly made me think of the famous Swedish actress. As for her performance, this supported well with Gudnason and ended up being fairly integral, especially in the first half.
I was astonished to find out that Bjorn Borg's actual son Leo played his younger self during the film.

The technical aspects were not that exceptional, but all were perfectly fine in their execution. It was shot really nice and everything looked of that time period. However, I would have liked the Tennis action to have been shot with more added drama as it felt a bit conventional.

I only have minor problems with the film, and its a bit of a catch-22 situation. It does some unnecessary over-the-top moments. Also, while it is great at being informative, it can't match in entertainment and intensity, and it's highly predictable. But as its a sports film, it sort of goes with the territory.

As they were going for a literal adaptation, I think it was always going to be tough to make this a story made for the big screen. So as for someone who already knew the story and the background of the players, I felt they presented it to a satisfactory level.
I was still interested and gripped with the story as it explored the origins of the two central characters mentality towards the game and their playing style with a good execution.

It will be interesting to see how people think of the film not knowing the result and history of this event. It would also make a great companion piece to 'Rush' as it has similar tropes to the rivalry in that film.

It was great for me personally to see another Tennis film, and we still have another one on the way in a couple of months.

Rating: 7/10

Review: Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Another Matthew Vaughn film, means fun, sweet sweet fun. But now, he's in new territory with his first sequel.
Three years ago, we saw the first Kingsman and it was universally seen as a nice surprise that brought a lot of life and fun back to the spy genre.

Now that we have some form of expectation for a Kingsman film, the pressure is certainly on. But I think a lot of people including myself have faith in Vaughn, because he has a style that works really well with a mainstream crowd.

My first feeling after seeing it, it was like they never left. Literally from the first minute, you're back in the action.
Like a lot of Vaughn's films, the first Kingsman had an over-the-top tone that reminded me a lot of actions films pre-2000's. Now that you're aware of the tone from the first film, Vaughn takes it up another level and you just absorb the ridiculous characters, action and story.
I was liking all of the new additions that were introduced, as well as the twists and turns this film took. I liked the risks it took when it needed to. The relentless action does get a bit exhausting towards the second act. But thankfully, you feel re-charged in time for the finale. There is one moment in that final act that got me thinking whether they have a particular cut of the film for each day of the week. Once you see this scene, you will understand what I mean. If they do, then that is quite clever.

Taron Edgerton continues to show how talented he is and how well he can carry this movie in the leading role. I will be interested to see how the young Brit deals with his next big project. All the high-calibre British talent on show were as reliable as ever. Mark Strong and Colin Firth were solid supports for Edgerton. There are also plenty of cameos from many other famous Brits that wanted a piece of the pie. There is one particular cameo that is great for the most part, but also felt over-used at times. I was intrigued to see how Julianne Moore would do, as this is most definitely not the type of movie you would usually see her in. At times, she looked out of place. But on the whole, I thought she was alright. Pedro Pascal was better than expected. I usually see him as more of a TV actor. But he seemed to fit in well within this world and I hope this is the kick-start into his movie career.
If you've seen the trailers, then you will know that there are plenty of Americans on show in this. I felt Channing Tatum and Jeff Bridges were good despite the small screen-time they had. There was another big American actor involved. But I won't say as I had no idea they were even in it before going to see it.

The action is as exciting and highly energetic as you would expect and is most definitely the films strongest aspect. Every action set-piece was highly entertaining and very well choreographed. Another aspect that made the first film so successful, was the comedy. In this, there were a solid amount of laughs throughout, including one towards the end of the second act that had everyone in my screening including myself in fits of laughter.

Sadly, there were a few problems that stopped me it from calling it a great film. I felt it over-stayed its welcome, especially during the second act. You could certainly feel the 2hrs 21mins duration.
As mentioned before, the action and pacing is almost too much and I felt exhausted at times. There is a lot going on that it almost goes a bit too fast for its own good, and you start to see it lose pacing and tone at times.
The film also did something that quite a few big-budget action films have been doing over the past few years, and that is having a famous song being played during some of their set-pieces. Some movies have done it too much and make the film feel more like a music video. Sadly, this film has moments when it falls under that category. It worked some times, but not all the time.

That being said, it remains a super fun time and it's certainly a worthy sequel. I enjoyed it for what it was and while the first one felt cleaner in its execution, The Golden Circle still packs a punch that can rival its predecessor.
Taron Edgerton is still great and keeps you interested in many of the character driven moments. The action and comedy is consistently strong and it is great to see another fun spy movie with many over-the-top aspects that we almost don't see at all with other new releases from this genre.

Rating: 7/10

Review: Mother!

A new film by Darren Aronofsky that is being heavily talked about in the past usually indicates controversial themes and ideas presented on screen.

Previous examples have been Requiem For A Dream and Black Swan. The former is probably a film with the most depressing themes I have ever seen and one of the most unsettling films of all-time. Yet, I have in my top 100 films of all-time list.
As for the latter, it is certainly more accessible and still a lot of socially awkward scenes.

His most recent project was Noah. While I thought the film was alright with some interesting moments, it felt incredibly tame for someone like Aronofsky to be director.

As for this new piece of work, I think it is safe to say that he is back on form. Now I am not necessarily saying "back on form" as in another great film, but another highly unsettling film that will cause everyone to talk about. Now be prepared, because I have so much to talk about.

From the first scene, you could already tell that something is off. I could already see possible fantasy elements to this story. The story was falling into a mystery thriller which I felt was what the trailer was suggesting. But I knew that with it being Aronofsky, that this to fall off the rails at some point.
In comes the second act, which starts to slowly get out of control. It almost lost me. However, the more surreal the story and images got, the more everything clicked together for me.
For me, the feeling of suddenly losing touch with what the film is trying to show to suddenly getting everything is quiet a joyous one. I was seeing so many deep metaphors and meanings, mainly in religion. It explores environmental issues, the consequences of being a celebrity, a modern day equivalent of the progress of religion particularly Christianity.
There is one massive segment that helps support this in the second half of the film that is wonderfully crafted, shot, executed and perfectly edited that I could watch again and again. I would have loved to have seen how Aronofsky and his team made that happen. I also witnessed one scene that deeply effected and shocked me. It is almost up there with my most unsettling scene of all-time from 'Under The Skin'.
The final act sees everything come to a head with a few moments that pretty much confirmed to what I was thinking this film was trying to portray and symbolize.

So many people are going to are think this is either brilliant or the biggest pile of pretentious rubbish. For me, these are the most interesting films of all, because it gets people talking. After leaving the screening, my mind was racing in all sorts of directions and I have been thinking about so many aspects to this film. I was adoring the metaphors and symbolism. I am understanding more and more even as I type.

The performances on the whole did their job well. Jennifer Lawrence's performance is innocent, raw and intense. I get the hate for Lawrence as it's natural to possibly show jealously for someone who got too famous too quickly. But I think she did a great job with this.
Javier Bardem played his part rather well and perfectly executed the reason for his characters actions. Seeing Michelle Pfeiffer was such a nice welcome as I think she is a great actor and still has a sexy presence to her. Ed Harris also has his creepy moments. There is also a surprise cameo that certainly came out of nowhere with all the chaos happening on screen at the time of their arrival.

The technical side of the film is so strong that it deserves many awards nominations. So much of the camerawork is intimate, frenetic and reminded me a lot of Requiem For A Dream and Black Swan especially. That style of cinematography is probably the most integral part of why this film for me is great. One aspect that I almost never mention, is the sound design. There's very clever sound design early on that I noticed in my screening. It was as if you were moving around with the central character and experiencing their environment and point of view.

With all of this being said, I did have some flaws with it. The pacing especially in the middle was a bit inconsistent and hard to adjust to. They were many scenes that were supposed to feel socially awkward that just did not work for me. Some scenes do drag but I think that might leave me on a second viewing.
Also, while I did not feel it to be pretentious, I can see it coming across as that.

I'm glad I knew very little about this. All I knew was that it was very divisive. So I was prepared to be disappointed or even angry. But thankfully, I eventually eat it all up and want more.
A film that so many messages crammed into it has the easy potential to be a complete mess. But I felt his execution to be so masterful and I really enjoyed it. It will certainly have me thinking about it over at least the next week.

This movie is design to unsettle you, frustrate you and it will do that in so many different ways. But if you absorb the surreal nature of it, you will be heavily rewarded in the end.
Nothing is wasted and everything is a detail. Some of it can go a bit off track. But by the end of it, it is propelling so far on track that it becomes so satisfying and almost heavenly.
This film makes up for the somewhat disappoint of Noah in tenfold. There are many moments that remind me of a having nightmare and there are things happening that you have no control over.

There are a lot of similarities to Rosemary's Baby. Even one of its posters is near enough identical to it. I also saw bits from The Shining, The Lord Of The Rings.

One thing is for sure, is that this is will be heavily polarizing and devisive much like to what Requiem For A Dream was. General audiences I think will hate it. But without trying to sound superior, I got so much out of it.

I can complete understand if you end up hating it, or even being angry towards it. That's the beauty of films like this. The type of film that can make the audiences exert extreme behavior that are both highly positive and negative is quite an achievement. It gets people talking. Similar films are ones like Cloud Atlas, The Fountain and The Neon Demon which I really like and films like Synecdoche New York and Inherent Vice which I did not get at all but appreciated nonetheless.
Now that I've read a bit more as to why Aronofsky made this, I can see why it will be seen as pretentious by many people. But the message coming across is both very topical, political and also timeless. I can get supposedly pretentious films. But if I enjoy them as well as understand it, then we have a huge hit that I will give high praise to it till the end of time.

For me, Aronofsky has given us something so extraordinary that it will be discussed for quite some time. This is the type of film that maybe your initial reaction to the film won't be your true view on the film.
In the end, I still feel Black Swan and Requiem For A Dream is still superior. But this is still something special despite it coming across a pretentious.

If you haven't seen it, then if I may, I will give you advice. Try not to look at as a realistic narrative, but more of a metaphor of life and the progression of religion. If you're more into your symbolism, then definitely check this out. If not, then maybe avoid it. But if you were initially intrigued, I would still check it out and you can have your own opinions on it.

If you have seen and are stuck on what this film is about. Feel free to comment and I would happy to have a discussion with you without spoiling the film.

I will be interested to see how well this ages over the next few years.

Rating: 8/10

Review: It

As many of my regular followers will know, Horror is a genre that I struggle to consistently find really good films from. Most of my favourites are from the late 70's and 80's.

Another thing that I struggle to find good adaptations of, is films based on Stephen King novels. The good ones are among some of the greatest films of all-time. However, the majority are either huge disappointments or just plain terrible.

Now what would intrigue to go and see a horror film based on a Stephen King novel?

Well for a start, the trailers showed a lot of potential. It is hard to ignore the heavy amount of successful marketing it has been generating, and it is rare to see that from a horror film. That alone almost did it for me. But the early reviews from reliable sources and hardcore horror fans was the seal of approval for me to get my view on it from a big screen experience.

Many people might remember the mini TV-series from the early 90's of this story. I never saw them. But like many, they do remember seeing terrifying images of Tim Curry as the infamous clown Pennywise.

Now that I've finally experienced this story, it ended up being the type of horror I was hoping for. It's set in the 80's and they manage to pay great homage to horror films from that era by executing the tropes so well that made horrors from that era highly entertaining. The fact that they concentrate more on the characters than the monster, that feeling of why there are hardly any parents in these films, or the type of jump scares and of characters that we have. Like the leader, the potential love interest, the one who starts out like a wimp, the one with all the quips and many others.

The acting is great by everyone involved. Bill Skarsgard does a great job as the terrifying Pennywise. It can't be an easy task trying to convince the audience that he is a genuinely terrifying clown. It could have ended up as unintentionally funny. But he manages to capture the true nature of the character and not just be a scary looking clown. It could be one of the best performances of a iconic horror monster in recent years. Also the perfect mix of scary make-up and visual effects felt seamless and really enhanced the character.
As for the child actors, they were all great. Jaeden Lieberher did quite a job in a leading role. After seeing him in Midnight Special, I am glad to see get offered bigger roles. Finn Wolfhard was great and gave a lot well executed comedic moments. Sophia Lillis was a strong presence and it was also a nice surprise seeing Nicholas Hamilton in a fairly significant supporting role after being impressed by him in Captain Fantastic.

It also looks great, the cinematography enhances so many scenes and the 80's feel and the score by Benjamin Wallfisch worked and fitted the tone perfectly.

Sadly, I did have some problems with it. What prevented me from calling this film great rather than good, was that there were quite a few scenes that felt disjointed and completely ruined the flow.
While though scenes on its own were perfectly fine, together they just felt like there were pieces missing. I think maybe some character development would have been fine to fill in the gaps. Just something for continuity sake would have been acceptable.
Also, the duration felt too long for me.

Despite those notable negatives, I still had a good and surprisingly fun time with it. When horror can be scary and fun at the same time, then it's alright in my books.
It had a lot of things that I like in my favourite horror films. It had more than just jump scares. It had well developed characters and interesting themes and ideas. There are very few dull scenes and it has surprisingly mature themes.
Even though I had some quarrels with it, I was really happy that we have another good Stephen King adaptation and I will be excited for a likely sequel.

Rating: 7/10

Review: Wind River

Hearing the success it got at the Sundance Film Festival and the writer of Sicaro and Hell Or High Water returning as writer as well as director, this sounded like something I and many others needed to check out.

The writer is Taylor Sheridan and this guy has talent. If you like your slow-burning crime-related dramas with a lot of interesting in-depth themes, then check out his work and any of his future projects.

According to Sheridan, these three films are a loose trilogy on the modern America frontier. If that's the case, then this was a fitting final part. Throughout the film, there is a chilling feel to it and as the story and characters slowly development, we are eventually absorbed into this tough world.
Then we get treated with one of the most satisfying and phenomenal finale's I have seen for some time.

Sheridan's writing is as top notch as ever. It really effects you how you view the world. It did it for me in Sciario, Hell Or High Water and now with this. What I also liked about the writing is that it made the location a character in itself. You get that with some mystery films, and that always adds to the tension. A great example is Christopher Nolan's 'Insomnia'. If you haven't seen that, definitely check it out.

While Sheridan's previous works have strong performances, this I don't think is as strong or memorable. Despite that, Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen still did a solid job. It is probably Renner's best performance. He really seemed to lose himself in his character and it is one of those moments that you forget that someone is acting. Olsen played the 'fish out of water' concept to her character rather well and her chemistry with Renner worked rather well.
A couple of minor notes. Firstly, Gil Birmingham gives a memorable performance despite it being a minor role. Also, there is a cameo from a pretty big name that came out of nowhere which was a nice surprise.

There is lots to like from the technical side. The wintery Wyoming landscape was beautifully shot and the eerie score perfectly the environment, tone and tension. I will certainly be listening to the music again.

I do have minor quarrels with it though. While I am always up for a slow-burner. The first two acts while good did not feel strong or had me totally gripped. Also there was one scene that felt out of place in terms of continuity. But you'll be glad to know that this is just me nit-picking.

In the end, I was quite moved by this mystery crime drama that slowly brews itself into something that deeply effected me with chilly effect.
It covers some pretty serious themes, and with the film being based on true events, the whole viewing experience is even more powerful.
The slow-burn pacing might put off some people. But the phenomenal and brutal final act is worth waiting for. It has been a while since I have seen such a satisfying finale.

Rating: 8/10

Review: Patti Cake$

Here comes a release of another hit from the Sundance Film Festival at the start of this year. The general consensus coming from the screenings, was that it was a rap version of La La Land. That already sounded intriguing. But the trailers did not match my initial response. However, I still had enough confidence that the full film would match with the reviews from Sundance.

Now that I've seen it, La La Land is most certainly not the main ingredient. It's more of a mix between '8 Mile', 'Hustle & Flow' with a hint of 'La La Land'.
The first half moves a long at a solid pace with some interesting aspects of the story and some captivating dream sequences. It wasn't until the second half of the film where I started to truly believe in the story and the characters motivations. It's a rags-to-riches story, and that is always tough to give it a refreshing new look. But I think what just about gave this film an exceptional rating, was the believability our main characters experienced throughout.
By the end of it, it gave me the feeling of punching the air, which is what any similar story should aim to achieve.

The performances were pretty good across the board. Leading the way is Danielle Macdonald, who gives us quite a star-turning performance and could be an early shout for some possible award nominations. There are also top supporting performances by Siddharth Dhananjay, Mamoudou Athie, Cathy Moriarty and Bridget Everett. They all have great chemistry with Macdonald, and each have their defining moment on screen.

While it does go through similar tropes that we have see with many underdog stories before, the strong performances and believable story won me over.
This will most likely be a tough sell for many demographics as it involves heavy rapping. But I felt that you can look beyond the music and see a well developed and inspiring story with a powerhouse display by Macdonald.

Rating: 8/10