FILMS
Screen Room Klings On for dear life through director J.J. Abrams reinvention of Star Trek, experiences the fading glory of a Parisian courtesan in ChĂŠri, and screws in the studs for a right pasting from Brian Clough in The Damned United.
FILM
STAR TREK
A clever blend of homage, remake and prequel, Star Trek could well be the spark that reignites this legendary franchise. The growing obscurity of the various Voyagers and Enterprises has left casual fans of the show feeling more than a little lost in space. However, this bold, brash reinvention of the original, classic crew is not only a thrilling reminder of how enshrined these characters have become in popular culture, it’s also the summer’s first great blockbuster. Beginning with a bang, a birth and a death, human James Tiberius Kirk is ushered into the universe whilst his father heroically sacrifices himself to a marauding band of alien aggressors, the Romulans. Growing up on earth without a father, post-adolescent Jim (Chris Pine) is a petulant but gifted waster, offered a chance at self-fulfilment by joining the intergalactic peace-keeping force, Starfleet. Kirk’s apprenticeship runs parallel to that of Spock (Zachary Quinto), a half-human, half-Vulcan officer whose complex heritage leaves him unable to choose between the dangerous compassion of humanity and the cold logic of the Vulcan race.
Unsurprisingly, the special effects are utterly mesmerising. From the quiet majesty of Vulcan to the alien-Goth tentacles of the Romulan ship, jaw-dropped gawping is strongly encouraged. Unlike similar prequel projects, however, this computer trickery does not obscure a flat story or lifeless characterisation. The set pieces are not indulgent and care is taken to establish some empathy for the people inside the bundles of pixels. How fans of the original Star Wars trilogy must wish that George Lucas had handed the reins of his cinematic behemoth to a director with as much panache and restraint as J.J. Abrams. USA Dir: J.J. Abrams, 2009, 126mins
12A Showing at Odeon from 8 May
The young cadets’ first mission is to investigate a seemingly innocuous ‘space storm’, a simple assignment that soon throws Kirk and Spock into fiery opposition. When the disturbance is revealed to be an attack on Spock’s home planet by the Romulans, led by ludicrous über-villain Nero (Eric Bana), the inexperienced crew must, fittingly, travel through time and space to combat these tattooed warmongers. ‘Trekkie’ reaction to the appointment of Abrams to the Star Trek director’s chair was not largely positive. Creator of the increasingly hollow Lost and the enormously po-faced Cloverfield, the biggest problem would appear to his inability to capture the fun of the original gang of Shatner, Nimoy et al. However, aided by a largely unknown cast, Abrams has managed to faithfully preserve the lovable silliness of the crew – Scotty (Simon Pegg…having a great time), Russian navigator Pavel Chekov (Anton Yelchin) and Japanese pilot Hikara Sulu (John Cho) – whilst also lending the mythology of the series some much-needed energy. Both leads are hugely watchable, particularly the graceful calm of Quinto’s Spock: whose ‘Vulcan Death Grip’ remains a peculiar crowd-pleaser.
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OF HAWKHURST
FILM
THE READER As her sly Oscar thanks to Ricky Gervais confirmed, Kate Winslet knows that her success in The Reader was something of selffulfilled prophecy. Playing a foul-mouthed version of herself in a 2005 episode of Gervais’ Extras, the Reading actress explained that “doing a Holocaust movie” was a dead cert for an Academy Award. Three years on, that film arrived and Hollywood played its part gamely; an amusing confluence of events that should not detract from Daldry’s fine film. In mid 90s Berlin, barrister Michael Berg (Ralph Fiennes) reflects on his great lost love, Hanna Schmitz (Winslet) whom he met in 1958. After a brief, passionate relationship, the two were reunited in 1966, when Hanna was revealed to have been a concentration camp guard; Berg attending the trial as a young law student. Studying their attempts to preserve normality in the face of a troubling past, the film is a moving, sobering love story.
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USA/Germany Dir: Stephen Daldry, 2008, 124mins Showing at Trinity Theatre 3 June
DEAN SPANLEY Put simply, Dean Spanley is your everyday tale of a father, a son and a man who used to be a dog. Boasting an impressively mixed cast, this Kiwi/British co-production is based on a little known fictional memoir by Lord Dunsany, My Talks with Dean Spanley. In it, crotchety Horatio Fisk (Peter O’Toole) is a constant burden to his son, Henslowe (Jeremy Northam). In an attempt to lighten his father’s morbid irritability, Henslowe attempts to engender a friendship between him and a new local clergyman, Dean Spanley (Sam Neill).
A BUNCH OF AMATEURS Burt Reynolds is perfectly cast as fading Hollywood star Jefferson Steel in this light ensemble piece. Needing a shot of credibility, Steel jumps at the chance to play King Lear in ‘Stratford’, England. Unfortunately, the Stratford in question turns out to be in Surrey and the production an amateur one. Eschewing the conventions of reality in this situation (i.e. Steel buggering off immediately), the film has the actor put up by busybody Imelda Staunton, reviled by pompous thesp Derek Jacobi and generally inadvertently humiliated. The gags are old, the plot familiar and the characters fairly stock, but a cast of this skill use what they’re given to its best effect. Their talents were certainly enough to impress HRH Liz, who allegedly chose the film as the family’s annual festive flick at Sandringham.
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UK Dir: Andy Cadiff, 2008, 96mins Showing at Trinity Theatre 27 May
Meeting over dinner, it soon becomes clear that Spanley is a man of some eccentricity, principally in the belief that he is a reincarnated dog. These unusual revelations disturb Horatio’s weary march to the grave, and Spanley’s quirks soon infect everyone around him. An utterly engaging joy, with another performance to treasure from O’Toole.
Trinity Theatre U
New Zealand/UK Dir: Toa Fraser, 2008, 100mins Showing at Trinity Theatre 2 June
Church Road, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN1 1JP
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FILM
CHÉRI
Never one to ignore the chance to pout, purr and prowl, Michelle Pfeiffer excels in this provocative tale of a Parisian courtesan. Using a sprightly – if slightly silly – narrator, we are informed that events take place in the ‘Belle Époque’, that vague kneesup before the First World War that produced champagne, haute couture and most things indulgent. This was an age, we are told, when the high-class prostitute prospered; women of international repute, entertainers of noblemen, dukes and monarchs. One such woman was Léa de Lonval (Pfeiffer), now an aging beauty, contemplating retirement. Finding herself unable to make friends ‘outside of the profession’, she spends much of her time in the company of another ex-courtesan: the nauseating Madame Peloux (Kathy Bates). Her brooding son – known as Chéri (Rupert Friend) – has a suitably spoilt attitude to life, befitting a boy raised on his mother’s excessive wealth. When Léa is asked to relieve the boy from the excesses of Paris, their country sojourn becomes the start of a passionate, six-year relationship.
The complexity of their separation provides an explanation for the film’s awkward first third, in which their fiery coupling is established very swiftly, and never terribly convincingly. Once the differing, even cynical, needs of the lovers is revealed, the decision to hide much of their happiness begins to make sense. Pfeiffer also improves as the action progresses; once her character’s desperation takes hold, it becomes a late-career performance of some note. The focus on her is a difficulty in itself; Christopher Hampton’s script and Frears’ camera are fascinated by Léa; her dangerous beauty and tragic sadness. The presence of a second principal character – and one whose name provides the title – is almost an annoyance, something only to be dutifully observed. This uneven portrayal shifts Chéri away from unfettered romance, a fact exemplified by Friend’s performance; his being a male lead that remains consistently unlovable. Sauntering across the screen with venom in every stare, and confused boredom in every utterance, he ensures that the couple are doomed to inevitable heartbreak. This very un-classical love is a strange fuel for drama, initially unsatisfying but ultimately strangely thought-provoking.
When Chéri’s mother decides her son’s love affair with an excolleague is becoming intolerable, she arranges a marriage for him to the beautiful, submissive Edmée (Felicity Jones). After this decisive manoeuvre, the film becomes an intriguing game of romantic chess; Chéri’s marriage requires his obsession with Paris’ social hub to be curbed, and Léa quickly departs for sunny Biarritz, picking a brawny lothario as a soulless rebound. In their bitterness, Léa and Chéri treat their respective new partners miserably, never allowing themselves to fully appreciate the affection felt for one another. It is in these final two thirds, after an overly stilted and flat opening, that Chéri truly justifies itself as an intriguing examination of bourgeois romance.
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UK/Germany Dir: Stephen Frears, 2009, 92 mins, Showing at Kino from 15 May
FILM
THE DAMNED UNITED
CORALINE This eagerly anticipated animated feature is the work of long-time Tim Burton collaborator Henry Selick. His direction of The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach has seen him consistently labelled as the master of stopmotion technology and first choice candidate for the medium’s first ever 3D release. Source material comes from the novella of the same name by graphic artist Neil Gaiman about little girl Coraline (voiced by Dakota Fanning) and her adventures in the ‘Other World’, located through a door in her apartment complex. Though the Dahl/Lewes-esque premise is familiar, Gaiman’s vision is not cute. ‘Other World’ begins as a welcoming replica of Coraline’s own life, where versions of her mother (Teri Hatcher) and father (John Hodgman) shower her with love. However, these replicas – whose eyes have been replaced with buttons – are unwilling to let her leave, and this fantasy world becomes a living nightmare. A freaky, beautiful treat.
PG
USA Dir: Henry Selick, 2009, 100mins Showing at Kino from 22 May
IS ANYBODY THERE? Michael Caine plays the lovable old geezer card to enjoyable effect in theatre director Crowley’s gentle drama. He plays Clarence, an elderly ex-magician who is forced into a rest home, whose careworn stories and practised tricks are a rare source of excitement for the home’s youngest resident, Edward (Bill Milner). A ten year old whose parents own and run the business, his is a frustrating existence, unimproved by his mother’s advice to revel in the vast experience of the pensioners. Clarence and Edward share stories, thoughts, feelings and frustrations about their respective situations, forming an unusual but heartfelt bond in the process. As classic dramatic wisdom dictates, both old man and young boy learn from one another, but preachiness and over-sentiment are avoided through the acting: a deft, charming turn from Caine and an unshowy child performance from Milner. Quietly uplifting.
12A
UK Dir: John Crowley, 2008, 95mins Showing at Kino from 8 May
The year is 1974. The gobbiest man in English football, Brian Clough (Michael Sheen), has been appointed manager of Leeds United, the country’s most successful club. A restless media celebrity, Clough had been critical of the aggressive means by which Leeds had achieved their domestic honours, using his own meteoric triumph with Derby County to condemn the team, and their beloved manager Don Revie (Colm Meaney). Based on David Peace’s controversial fiction-meetsfact account, the two strands of drama informing Hooper’s well observed film are Clough’s tempestuous but loving relationship with his assistant, Peter Taylor (Timothy Spall), and his obsessive desire – so the films tells it – to best Revie’s achievements. There are historical question marks (it’s hard to believe a man of Clough’s pride would phone his rival, half-drunk, to berate him), but Sheen’s compelling impersonation is worth the asking price alone. The man is now the missing link between Clough, Blair, Frost…and Kenneth Williams.
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UK Dir: Tom Hooper, 2009, 97mins Showing at Kino from 8 May
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