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Tuesday 17 December 2013

New Release Review: 'The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug'

                                               
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My goodness that was long. Really really long. Fortunately The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (or The Hobbit 2, as most everyone is going to call it) isn't as soporifically boring as its predecessor; not an accolade worth framing, but a fact I greatly appreciated it.

The story so far: Bilbo (Martin Freeman) and his dwarf companions, plus Gandalf (Ian McKellen), have made a reasonable start on their journey to the Lonely Mountain, where they're going to try to steal from a dragon. Other things happened in the first film, but 'happened' may be too strong a word: a lot of the happenings consisted of little more than eating, singing and a spot of walking. At the start of the second film our heroes are still working hard on the walking - and as they plod along, dark forces are rising. So far, so familiar. A trilogy of films in which there's lots of walking and some evil rising? I do believe this ground has been thoroughly covered elsewhere. To add to the feeling of déjà vu a lot of the dialogue sounds like its been lifted wholesale from the original trilogy: Gandalf speaks of an evil slowly manifesting (tick), tells a cobbled together fellowship that a path is probably safe, when it's no such thing (tick), and has to abandon the group to check out a gut feeling he has (tick). This gives the impression that Tolkien's Middle Earth can only support a very narrow form of storytelling. Which I doubt. The more likely reason for the déjà vu is that Peter Jackson can't let go of The Lord of the Rings. Time and again he tries to tie The Hobbit to the original trilogy in ways that it neither wants nor needs. The most notable example being the inclusion of Legolas (Orlando Bloom) and a love interest, Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly). Their storyline has been invented wholesale by Jackson, and the only reason it's remotely bearable is because Lilly has (by my count) at least three facial expressions more than Liv Tyler, who had an equivalent role in The Lord of the Rings.

Elsewhere things are more promising. Freeman is still great as Bilbo, the soaring vistas are as jaw dropping as they've ever been, and the action is more involving and less video game-y than in the first film. The choreography during these sequences is particularly inventive. Especially the brilliantly absurd barrel fight, during which one dwarf takes down several squads of orcs whilst tumbling down a mountain. It's a scene reminiscent of Jackson's early films, which were prone to demented flights of fancy. The down side to this moment is it crystallises one of the film's main problems: the orcs are the least lethal creature in all of Middle Earth. Their kill count is - and this is being very charitable - a little low. They're terrible at their job. I'd estimate that at least two hundred orcs die for every elf, hobbit, or dwarf they kill. Maybe three hundred. If the film weren't two hours and forty minutes long then this might be less apparent. But because it goes on (and on, and on) there's plenty of time to muse on its flaws and incongruities. Such as: who would work as a builder in Middle Earth? Aren't the chances of dying whilst carving a stone step into a miles high mountain pretty high? Whose paying to have the work done? Is it just more work done by the orcs? Are the orcs slaves? If they're not slaves then why would they sign up to the orc army? Where are all the female orcs? Are there little orclings being left fatherless by all the death and dismemberment left in the wake of Bilbo and the others? The random ruminations go on.

Long story short: The Hobbit should still be a single film. No it doesn't matter that Jackson is also adapting the appendices. If Tolkien thought the notes and histories he put into the appendices should be in the book itself, then he'd have put them in the book. Unfortunately we're not going to be getting one film, but maybe one day someone will put together the anti-Director's Cut, a single three-hour film. A simple tale of one hobbit's journey, unadorned by superfluous storylines and tedious discussions on what everyone's father, or father's father, did or did not do to get them into their present circumstance. Focus on Bilbo, and focus on the greed that drives the men, the orcs and the elves, and you have a story worth telling. I'd bet that could be done in a single 180-minute sitting, and it'd be a film worth seeing. I can't say that of what Jackson has produced so far.

Overall: 6/10
or
The Actual Story: 8/10
The Appendices: 6/10
The Newly Invented Twaddle: 4/10

Monday 9 December 2013

New Release Review: 'Blue is the Warmest Colour'


What people find sexy differs wildly. Me? I've always found a fleeting touch, stolen glance, or first kiss carries a greater charge than the point to which it's all leading. Anticipation is everything. (In films that is. In real life I find... I find it to be none of your business what I find. Move along.) Blue is the Warmest Colour is 90% stolen glances and 10% getting down and dirty. In a film with a running time of three hours, that's an awful lot of down and dirty.

Supposedly the story is about 17-year-old Adèle's affair with the sultry and self-involved art student Emma (Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux, respectively), but an hour passes before they first talk, let alone touch. The relationship is at the centre of the film, but it's not what it's about. It's about belonging. Adèle is forever trying to find where she fits in. She dates a boy, but that doesn't feel right; she's kissed by a girl in her class, but that leads nowhere; she hangs out with various disparate groups: artists, lesbians and, later on, colleagues (as well as, a little too randomly, and with next to no explanation, a gay best friend who materialises from nowhere), but she rarely feels at ease with any of them. It's during the film's early stretch, when this theme is front and centre, that the story is at its most promising. When Adèle's friends call her out on her distant manner (and her new friend Emma, who they all feel looks decidedly lesbian-y) Adèle has to lie to save face. When Emma first meets Adèle's parents she's also moved to lie, mentioning a non-existent boyfriend, as Adèle's father doesn't seem the understanding type. Abdellatif Kechiche, who directed and co-wrote the film, doesn't spend long on these moments. Moments which are fascinating and dramatic in a way that a lot of what follows isn't. The scenes of posturing, smoking and talking about philosophy and art (which are numerous, and so quintessentially French that they're verging on parody) are passable, but could easily have been scaled back so that more time could be spent on the turning points in Emma and Adèle's relationship. And then there's the sex scenes...

I'm all for sex. Sex is great. (Again, I'm talking about in film. Perverts.) But here it feels glaringly out of place, despite the subject matter. The act itself isn't the problem, it's how it's handled. Most of the film is shot in natural light with a roving camera, but in the sex scenes the lighting takes on a harsher quality and the camera is often in a fixed position; usually one that will give the clearest view of the sexual gymnastics. It looks seedy rather than real. I didn't come away thinking Adèle and Emma are falling for each other, or are passionate about each other. I didn't feel I understood their relationship better. What I did come away with was a clearer idea of the practicalities of lesbian lovemaking. (Although numerous lesbian critics have their own qualms about these sequences. Namely about whether they're more about fantasy than reality.)

It's circuitously frustrating that one of the film's greatest strengths - stretching out the central relationship so that what would feel clichéd instead feels like life - is also its greatest weakness. Cut back the running time and you have a fairly straightforward tale of love and loss, but if you draw it out it becomes all to apparent that Adèle is nowhere near as interesting as everyone around seems to think she is.

Overall: 6/10